


Maconaquea

by Queen_Mab



Series: Bianca [1]
Category: Criminal Minds
Genre: Bad Parenting, Child Abuse, Children, Drama, Emotional Abuse, Familial Abuse, Family, Father-Daughter Relationship, Gen, Gen Fic, Hurt/Comfort, Kidnapping, Parenthood, Physical Abuse, Protectiveness, Reid as protector, Starvation
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-08-05
Updated: 2012-11-29
Packaged: 2017-11-11 12:14:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 43,276
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/478450
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Queen_Mab/pseuds/Queen_Mab
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Reid spent his time waiting for the BAU to find him at first. Then he realized they never would, and he decided to do his best to survive and make the most of it. After all, the unsub was right--there was a little girl that needed taking care of, and he could either live and do it for her, or die and leave her alone again. </p>
<p>Unfortunately for the unsub, Spencer Reid's love is a lot more powerful than he ever gave it credit for.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This was beta'd by nutella4ever from fanfiction.net. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it, and please remember to leave a comment.

“Have no fear of perfection. You’ll never reach it.” Salvador Dalí.

\---

Reid woke up in pitch blackness, surrounded by the smell of death.

Fear clutched at his heart and he shot into a sitting position. Darkness closed in on him, looking to squeeze his heart until there wasn’t any life left in him, but he slammed his fists down onto the cold stone floor, reigning in his fear, forcing himself to think rationally.

His heart beat against his chest, spreading adrenaline to all his muscles. He unclenched his fists, spreading his fingers out on the floor, and pushed himself into a standing position. He reached out blindly into the darkness, darkness that seemed to be yawning open to swallow him whole, and after a stumbling footstep, he touched a wall. He ran his hand against the surface, walking around room with that as his guide. There weren’t any doors. There was only stone.

This was a nightmare. This was a horrible nightmare, and the darkness was going to eat him up—

No. No, he wasn’t going to allow his fear take him over.

Reid stopped dead in his tracks, keeping one hand on the wall and forcing himself to think. He was in a door-less, window-less room made of stone, and if it was a dream, he wasn’t waking up. He knew that he hadn’t fallen asleep there. He had woken up confused and disoriented, but he had fallen asleep…

He had fallen asleep in a motel room. The team was on a case in North Dakota involving the rape and murder of six young immigrant women. They had deduced that the unsub was rich, probably for his whole life, and that that money made him careless and entitled. Reid had been staying up late in his room, perched on his bed, sipping tea and flipping through the files, hoping to find something to go on…

Then he must have fallen asleep.

Reid swallowed past the knot of anxiety in his throat. This wasn’t a dream, therefore it had to follow the rules of reality. He had probably been drugged. If he was drugged, then he had been taken somewhere. If he had been taken somewhere, there had to be a door.

He reached up, and he found that he could touch the ceiling with the very tips of his fingers. He held his breath, taking step by careful step across the dark cavern, concentrating, until the smooth surface of stone finally gave way to smooth wood. A trapdoor. He was underground.

He went on tiptoes to push against the trapdoor, but as expected, it was locked. Reid gave a frustrated sigh, his mind whirring and struggling to not pay attention to the darkness. He started to pace across the room, examining every detail and trying to see what he noticed. He counted each inch of the cell, ghosting his fingers along the stone and murmuring numbers under his breath. Clean. Someone had cleaned it, but they couldn’t get rid of the scent of death and misery.

And they couldn’t get rid of the horrible darkness.

He didn’t know how long it was before the trapdoor opened. The light blinded him, and in the moment it took to adjust, a half-full bottle and half a loaf of bread were thrown down and the door was shut again.

Reid pressed his fingers desperately against the trapdoor, but it was locked. He cursed under his breath, sitting down on the stone, and groping at the ground around him. Eventually, he found the bread and water.

He bit into the bread. Stale, and rough on his tongue, but food.

It was food.

\---

_‘I guess I’m just looking for it again – for the belief I had back in college, the belief I had when I first met Sarah and it all seemed so right. The belief in happy endings.’_

_Reid didn’t need to reread the letter. He had an eidetic memory, after all. Despite that, he didn’t put the paper down. His eyes remained blankly fixed on the paper, but he was seeing another letter. He was seeing the letter his father had left behind._

_He had no way of knowing how much time passed. Slowly, he folded the letter again. He slid it back into the envelope._

_He tried to forget._

\---

Three times, the trapdoor opened. Three times, a half-full bottle of water and a half a loaf of bread were dropped down. Three times, he had attempted to talk to his captor, warn him his colleagues at the FBI would find him, find some way to convince him to let him go. He talked quickly, feverishly, starting to reach a crescendo and beginning to hope that maybe, just maybe—

And then the trapdoor closed on him mid-sentence. Each and every time.

From his hunger and thirst, he estimated that he was getting food once a day to once every other day. And then he estimated that he was getting it once every three days. And then he couldn’t even hazard a guess. A while after the first time he was fed, his stomach started to growl. His throat became dry. He continually tried to moisten his mouth, even a little, but he couldn’t. His tongue became dry, and he felt himself becoming more and more sedentary in the darkness, trying to preserve what energy he had.

Soon, the bread and half-full bottle that were given to him couldn’t even scrape the surface of his need. Hunger gnawed at his stomach, pain spreading out from there as his body started to tear apart muscle in an attempt to prolong his life. The ache sank down into his very bones, making him feel utterly hollow.

Worse still than the pain was the thirst. The hunger pains left him lying in a fetal position, slowly sinking inside the void that was his own hollowness, but the thirst was constantly demanding attention, making his dried tongue swell and crack, leaking blood into his mouth, and making his head pound against the cold stone floor. His skin shriveled and tightened on his decaying muscles and hollowing bones, and the only movement he really made was to scratch his dry skin, even after he felt it split apart under his nails and blood stained his fingertips.

His heart fluttered against his ribs, trying to break out and fly away, to go somewhere that didn’t radiate pain. To go somewhere that it could lie down and see painless light one last time.

As he realized he was dying, he was struck by horrible fear. For a moment, he was utterly certain that he would waste away in that pit, and no one would ever know what happened to him. After everything he had been through, all the situations he’d thought his way out of, all the trials he had faced, he would die alone and helpless in a place made of nothing but blackness.

Panic gripped him, making his dry throat become tight, and he started scrabbling at the wall, trying to find purchase in the stone, scratching hard enough to tear his nails apart. His fingertips started to bleed, leaving sticky streaks on the rock, but he found seams between the blocks that had been cemented together. He pulled himself up, hissing at the pain in his fingers as the skin was ripped apart by the cement, but he relished the pain in his hands. It was _real_ pain, the pain that came with life, not the horrible pain in his stomach and hollowing body that threatened to extinguish him.

Standing up made his head spin. He stumbled, hitting his temple against the wall. Blue and red spots exploded in his vision, and he instinctively reached out for them, catching himself against the stone before he fell in an attempt to touch that brief moment of color. The pain pounding his skull was magnified, his temple starting to throb, and blood rushed to his head, heating it up. His arms trembled as he held himself upright, waiting for the vertigo to go away. No. He wouldn’t just waste away on the ground. He wouldn’t lie down and let himself die. He’d survive. He’d find a way to survive.

He kept one hand on the wall, and took a step. Then another. Then another. He started counting the steps it took to get from one end of the prison to another, counting and counting and counting and refusing to think about the hunger and thirst. He fingered the Orula’s Ide hanging off his increasingly bony wrist, remembering the man who gave it to him and remembering that it was meant to protect him. He had to have faith he would survive. He _had_ to.

The fourth time the trapdoor opened, it rattled at first. Gentle rattling, but it was so sharp compared to the regular muffled sound of footsteps above him that Reid started. It swung open, but he wasn’t blinded. Only soft starlight illuminated the world outside. This time, food wasn’t immediately dropped down. He had a moment to stop his counting and see outside, see the stars staring down at him, pick out the constellations and be reminded that the fear and darkness and hunger weren’t the only things in the world.

The figure above him was smaller than the captor that had been feeding him, but it was dark, so he couldn’t tell any more than that. It knelt by the edge of the door, holding out something he couldn’t see.

He pawed out, some awful part of him wondering if he could pull this person in and maybe use them as leverage to get out, but then his fingertips brushed against its arm. Its tiny, tiny arm with smooth skin. A child’s arm.

He immediately knew he wouldn’t harm the figure, not even to escape.

Then his hands found the figure’s gifts. Two full bottles of water, an apple, jerky, and a blueberry muffin.

The hunger and thirst roared with renewed vigor at the thought of being sated. He didn’t know why the child did this for him. He took the gifts quickly, his body trembling for some kind of sustenance, and before he did anything, he put them on the ground, taking one of the water bottles with shaking hands and draining it.

Water had never tasted so good.

He looked up again, seeing that the figure was still crouched above him, framed by stars, and he gave a hoarse “Thank you.”

The figure leaned further down, making a soft ‘shhhh’ sound.

But he didn’t stay quiet. It wasn’t in his nature to. “Are you a prisoner, too?”

The figure did not answer.

“Listen, I have friends. Friends that could help us both. Please, all I need is a—”

The figure made a louder ‘shhhh!’ noise before there was the sound of heavy footsteps, louder now that the trapdoor was open. The figure looked up, then immediately straightened, closing the door and leaving him in darkness once more.

He wanted to scream in frustration, but that would do nothing. He didn’t have the energy to waste. Instead, he did what he had been doing ever since he woke in the dark. He stayed sane. 

He forced himself to save the remaining bottle for later. He ate the apple and muffin, and he saved the less perishable jerky with the water.

And then he started counting the number of footsteps it took to get from wall to wall again, running his fingers along the Orula’s Ide on his wrist, and he remembered. He remembered his team. He remembered JJ’s wedding, and the smell of wet grass and champagne.

\---

_“Hey, is there room for two?”_

_Reid looked up from his position hunched over his sandwich. Emily stood there, her smile more nervous than he remembered. Strangely, she didn’t just sit down without waiting for a response. She stood there, and they were the only unmoving people in the café._

_He cleared his throat, leaning back in his chair. “Sure. Go ahead.”_

_She let out a breath she had been holding. She sat down across from him, yet between them, a gap yawned greater and greater until they could hardly see each other. Reid recognized it in himself. He never wanted to allow someone close again after they left him._

_He could only sit and watch as Emily’s eyes grew sad._

_She was just as aware of it as he was._

\---

Something victims of abduction never say is how the darkness starts to bleed into you.

There are cracks in a human body—seams between nail and skin, passages through orifices, even just fissures between skin cells. The darkness seeps in through these cracks. It doesn’t swallow you, nothing as sudden as that, but it brings you into itself. When you move, the darkness moves with you, like a singular piece of fabric.

When Spencer Reid breathed, he felt the black breathe with him. The air expanded and contracted with his chest, and the longer he was all alone, the further he felt his identity slip from his grasp. The beads around his wrist, given to him by Julio Ruiz for protection, only helped him for so long. Then it felt like they had fused with his skin, just blemishes in darkness.

The memories kept him from completely dissolving into the nothing. The memory of the joy radiating from JJ as she stood at the altar with Will. The memory of Rossi kissing his cheeks on his birthday. The memory of Morgan smiling, teasing, calling him ‘pretty boy’. The food given by his captor gave him life. The food gifted to him by the child gave him strength. Yet it was the memories, the experiences made with his friends, that gave him the power to keep his spirit intact. In the moments between dark wakefulness and sleep, he could imagine them talking to him. Encouraging him to stay strong. Telling him that they’ll come and find him.

By the time he had nearly become one with the darkness, he had to wonder where they were.

\---

_Sometimes he wished he had a lover, and for none of the right reasons._

_After grueling cases, he didn’t want to be alone. He didn’t want to go to bed alone, he didn’t want to think alone, and he most certainly didn’t want to face the darkness alone._

_Nonetheless, he knew they all had to go home eventually. He usually got his sleep out of the way on the jet. Then, when he was in that empty apartment, he’d spent his time reading. He would read and hope that his demons would be kept at bay for one more night._

\---

He received the paltry meal from his captor three more times. He received the sustaining gifts from that blessed child two more times, saving his body from consuming itself. By now, he had given up trying to talk to them. Where were his friends? Where was the BAU? It felt like he had been down there for years.

He now knew how many of the abduction victims felt. Passing time with numbers, memories, sleep… No one to talk to. Nothing to read. Nothing but darkness.

He had taken to pinching himself on the back of his hand. Just small pinches, not even bruising the skin. Just reminding himself he’s alive. Reminding himself that the memories were real.

Then the trapdoor opened again. He expected the child because the food wasn’t immediately dropped down. Instead, when his eyes adjusted, he saw the great form of his captor.

His pupils contracted. He ran his dry tongue over his cracked lips. “Wh… wh…”

“Shhh.” The figure, a manly silhouette, crouched down and held out arms into the cell. After a hesitation, his desire for light and freedom won out over caution, and he took the silhouette’s arms. He was pulled, his feet losing contact with the ground, and he was wrapped in light.

He was placed on his side, lying down. The world spun as his previously useless eyes were bombarded with stimuli, and he dug his fingers into the fiber of the soft rug he was lying on. It was too bright to see for a moment.

“Is he okay?”

He trembled. Fear clogged his throat, but he struggled to maintain a logical train of thought.

His vision cleared as much as it could without glasses. He was in a sunroom. There were three glass walls and a clear ceiling. There were woods outside, along with a shoulder-high wire fence. Alright, his captor was taking him out of his prison in broad daylight in a place any passerby could see, so he must be in an isolated location that his captor was comfortable with.

“Is he okay? He’s not talking.”

The voice registered properly this time. It was small, feminine, and more than a little squeaky.

The child.

He took a deep breath, then carefully rolled to his other side to see who was talking, who had saved his life, and he tried to not irritate the headache that had started banging his skull at the sudden presence of light.

“He’s fine. He’s moving.”

The entrance to a relatively nice house came into focus. Standing just inside, the tips of her toes curling past the threshold, was a little girl with a long braid and a white dress, just catching a bit of light. Black spots danced in his eyes as they adjusted, making her look bluish and blurred, not even sparing him the ability to make out her face.

For a moment, he felt an uncontrollable rush of affection for the girl. The little hands clutching her white dress were the hands that provided for him. That gave him the sustenance he needed to stay human. That allowed him to calm the horrible pain. Had he been able to, he probably would have thrown all common sense out the window and just given her a big hug of gratitude.

Yet above him was the great bulky shadow of a man. Black hair. Intelligent eyes. Broad shoulders. His captor.

The unsub.

“It’s okay, now. Everything will be alright.”

He wanted to say something, anything, but the truth was he couldn’t. His throat was dry, his head pounded, and he only had eyes for the little girl in the doorway. He tried to moisten his mouth, but before he could, he felt a hand on his arm, pulling him up to his feet.

He staggered, blind, but the unsub led him towards the little girl. She stepped away from the door, allowing them through, but she tagged along by their heels, close enough for Reid to occasionally feel the hem of her dress whisper against his ankles. Inside, back in dim light, everything looked bluish.

“I ran a bath for you!” that small, feminine, squeaky voice said. “We thought you might like one after being in there so long. Your glasses are by the sink, too.”

He wanted to thank her, thank her for everything, but his mouth remained too dry. He tried looking around, but everything was just smears of different colors that he wasn’t given enough time to distinguish. He struggled to orient himself, gain some knowledge of the place he was in.

He felt a soft, plush rug under his bare feet. The unsub was pulling him along, and then they were climbing stairs with a long red carpet on it.

“You’re quiet. That’s a good thing.” The unsub’s voice. Deep, but not evasive or obviously disturbed. It sounded like he knew how to appear normal. Normal. “You’re going to get cleaned up. After, you’ll have a nice hot meal and we’ll talk. As long as you behave, things will work out well here.”

There were paintings on the walls, but Reid couldn’t make them out well. Just human-shaped streaks on red and brown, washed with a blue filter.

Then the unsub opened a door and flicked on lights in another room. “Don’t be in there too long.”

And then he was pushed in, the door closed and locked behind him.

Reid stumbled in place, catching himself on a counter. He saw his glasses besides the sink, and he snatched them quickly, pushing them up the bridge of his nose.

The world became clear, and he slowly blinked the blue filter away.

He was… in a very, very nice bathroom. He looked back at the door he came through, then half-heartedly tried the knob. Locked, just as he thought.

He turned away from the door and leaned against it, observing the room with his cleared vision. It was white, with clean ceramic tiles, a white marble counter (with fresh, untouched shaving supplies—the unsub went so far as to give him something to shave with?), a toilet, two white towels, a fluffy white mat, and a steaming bath.

It felt like he had traded in a black void for a white one.

He glanced at the mirror above the counter. He half expected to see a man made entirely of darkness staring back at him. Instead, he just saw himself—Spencer Reid, with soiled clothes, hollow cheeks, and pasty skin. It was a jolt, seeing himself. He reflexively reached up, tracing the contours of his gaunt face, becoming familiar with his own features once again. The only splashes of color on him were the red of his healing scratches and the green and yellow of his Palo Mayombe bracelet. The sight of the beads, the only things that hadn’t degraded from the darkness, gave him an inexplicable feeling of calm.  

He was tempted to just sit there and contemplate the colors, but the concept of actually getting clean after so long in that awful place was irresistible. He quickly ran water over his palms to clean off the surface, and then took a long drink from the tap, finally calming the thirst that had still tormented him despite the girl’s efforts. Then he stripped off his ruined clothes, letting the stained rags fall to the floor before he carefully stepped into the bath.

He flinched at the heat, but slowly settled into the water anyway. Filth floated off of him, cleansing the darkness from the cracks it had needled into. He breathed, and for once, the air around him didn’t breathe with him.

He started cleaning the dried blood from his scabbed fingertips and flesh, and then analyzed the situation. He didn’t know where he was, who had captured him, or what they wanted him for. What he _did_ know was that he had survived the pit and he would find a way out.

He would find a way out.

\---

“Here, make yourself comfortable.”

Reid felt horribly exposed, but at the same time, it felt fantastic to have finally been able to bathe after so long in that horrid pit. He instinctively hunched over and wrapped his arms around his chest, trying to give himself the protection that his captor’s bathrobe couldn’t provide, and slowly sat down at the kitchen table, eyes darting around as he readjusted his glasses. This was a beautiful home, now that he could see it. The kitchen had state-of-the-art equipment, all kept shiny and clean, with a table in the center, which he was sitting at. Most of the doors he had passed thus far were able to be locked from the outside, with even the locks looking perfect and shiny. All he had noticed that was not the best of the best was the fact that there were not many windows—just artificial lights.

Alright, so the unsub was rich, liked to control where people could and couldn’t go, and didn’t like windows for some reason.

Before he could make any more observations, he heard small feet shuffling against the kitchen tile. He turned to look, strange excitement bubbling in his chest, and as expected, it was the little girl. Reid frowned, and he immediately knew why there were so few windows.

The girl was an albino. When one said someone had ‘skin as white as snow’, they were usually being hyperbolic. Not in this case. Deathly white skin with white hair to match, pulled into a long braid which she kept playing with. She looked surreal, like someone covered in costume makeup, but he felt another rush of affection for her nonetheless. For the girl who saved him.

She gave him a nod, big pale blue eyes looking him over, and then she scurried to the table, pulling herself up on a chair across from him where there was already a place setting.

The unsub—a sharp-eyed man about twice Reid’s size, though that wasn’t saying much—sat between the girl and the agent, putting down a plate in front of them both. On the plates was breakfast—bacon, scrambled eggs, and toast, with a knife and fork already put in place. The girl tucked in, but Reid eyed the food warily. He decided to eat, though, since he didn’t want to let onto the kindness he had been shown during his time in the pit and he couldn’t think of a reason for the unsub to drug him now.

The unsub gave a smile, but the corners of his eyes didn’t crinkle, making the look shiver-worthy. “There you go. Isn’t it nice to have food after that?”

Reid nodded cautiously, trying to weigh the man’s intentions. Kidnapping an FBI agent, keeping him in a dark prison for who-knew how long, and then suddenly treating him like a guest? Probably an attempt to induce Stockholm’s Syndrome, but to what end?

The girl looked up from her toast, a shy smile flickering across her face. She looked so tiny, all the way on the other side of the table. Reid guessed she was maybe… five years old? Six? It was difficult to tell. “It’s okay if you talk now, if you like. Right, Darcy?” 

The unsub—Darcy—nodded, lacing his fingers on the tabletop. “I’m sure you have questions. You can go ahead and ask them.”

Reid stared at the man warily while eating the eggs. He had to think about how he wanted to phrase things, worried as he was that he might trigger a violent episode in the unsub. “…Who are you?”

The man kept smiling, but Reid still wasn’t comforted in the slightest.

“I am Darcy.” He gestured to the girl across the table. She finished her toast, but her eyes stayed on Reid, big and curious. “This is Angeline.”

Reid hesitated. Angeline. That was the name of the girl who saved him. In his admittedly biased opinion, it was fitting. He gave her an awkward wave, which she returned. “Hi, Angeline. I’m Sp—”

“No need for that,” the unsub cut him off, something flashing behind his smile that put Reid even more on edge. “You don’t have a name. I’ll decide when you have earned one.”

No name?

Reid swallowed, putting both his hands in his lap. Stripping his identity away—could be a sign of plenty of things. Possibly that the unsub was a control freak, or he was reenacting the process he suffered when he was forced into some kind of institution, or… or he knew what he was doing, and he was trying to break Reid.

“A-alright.” It’d be best to not argue. Take time to gather more information, then make his move. Reid looked back at Angeline, forcing a smile. He doubted she was fully aware of the effect that stripping a name away could have, and he didn’t want to scare her. “Nice to meet you.”

Angeline smiled back at him, then looked at the unsub. “I like him, Darcy.”

“Good.” Darcy’s eyes lingered on the girl. It made Reid uncomfortable; he was always uncomfortable when children were involved with any unsubs. “That’s good. You’re here for her, after all.”

“I am?” Reid wished he had something to fiddle with. It was so hard to keep his nervousness from showing. “H-how so?”

“A lot of reasons.” The unsub nodded, standing up from his chair. “I’m a busy man, and I can’t teach her everything. You will take care of Angeline, and you’ll never want for anything again.”

Reid glanced back at the little girl, who was still smiling. To her, this was normal. Had there been other people like him? “W-why don’t you just hire a babysitter?”

The unsub just laughed, walking to Reid’s side and clapping him on the shoulder. The agent winced—the grip was painful. “Just do what I tell you to.”

Without waiting for an answer, the unsub started walking to the door. “Teach her how to read.”

The man left, a loud clicking telling Reid that the door was locked.

Angeline’s smile fell away. She didn’t look upset, but she looked serious. She pushed herself off her chair, taking her empty plate to the sink and starting to wash it. “Don’t try to escape. There’s no way out of this part of the house.”

Reid looked up at her, squeezing the edge of the table. “O-oh? Did other people try to escape?”

“Yeah. And he took them away.”

Angeline turned off the faucet, grabbing a dishtowel and drying off the plate. “The windows are locked. There’s a house alarm on in case anyone tries to get in or out without the password, there are locks all over the house, and he has an electric fence if none of that works.” She turned to look at Reid. He took a moment to examine her. Flawless complexion, very well cared-for hair, symmetrical features…

“It gets lonely around here without anyone to play with, so just stay around, please?” She opened up a cupboard placed under the counter, placing her dish on top of a pile. Reid continued eyeing her carefully, not entirely sure how to respond. Was she a victim? Or the unsub’s child, who he was desperate to spoil for some unknown reason?

He stood up, taking his own plate to the sink. There wasn’t enough information. He needed to figure out the layout of the house, where he was, why the unsub took him, and how many leads his team might already have. To figure that out, he needed time. For time, he needed the unsub to let him live.

And to live, he apparently needed to teach a little girl how to read. How hard could it be?

“Uh…” He cleared his throat, watching the little girl watch him. “You… do you have any books?”

Her little nose wrinkled, just like how Henry’s did when Garcia or JJ tried to get him to eat vegetables. “Why don’t we play chess instead? Or cards?”

Reid wrung his hands awkwardly. Somehow, a night of babysitting Henry and an episode of Mr. Belvedere didn’t seem like enough experience to deal with this. “Why not Boggle instead? Or Scrabble?”

Angeline scrunched up her face, then turned around, walking towards the only unlocked door. “You need to know how to read for those games.”

“That’s the point!” He followed her, only halfway paying attention to the conversation as he examined their surroundings. From the kitchen, they walked into a grand dining room, with a big table that Reid identified as mahogany and a plush Persian rug underfoot. The walls were adorned with artwork, but not by any artist Reid recognized. They were all paintings of pale men and women with white clothes and light-colored eyes and hair, usually doing something like ascending a palatial staircase or dancing alone in an empty theater. Very repetitive subject matter, but even from his brief glance, the painter seemed to have gone through painstaking lengths to make the people beautiful—symmetrical and flawless in every way. “You see, children are statistically more likely to retain knowledge if it’s presented to them in an interesting way, like through a game or—”

“I don’t like trying to read.”

She pushed her way out of the dining room, forcing Reid to follow before he could examine the art at all. They came out to a living room, lined with plush couches and bookshelves going from floor to ceiling, and a large plasma TV sat on the far end.

Pretty normal. Still very few windows, but normal. “Well… do you like magic tricks?”

She froze in place, then looked over her shoulder, arching one white eyebrow. “Magic tricks?”

When she stopped walking, Reid stopped walking. Huh. JJ was right. Kids loved magic.

“Y-yeah. I’m a magician, you know.”

Angeline considered him, then turned around, crossing her arms and pouting. “Are you lying to me?”

“No! I’m a magician, honest!” Reid sat down on a plush red couch, putting his hands on his knees. “I can show you a few, if you like.”

She crept forward, obviously enticed by the offer of magic. “You’re gonna ask me to do something before you do.”

“You’re a smart kid.” Reid smiled, keeping his eyes on her even as he was furiously analyzing the situation he was in. “If you spend twenty minutes trying to read with me, I’ll teach you a magic trick.”

She scowled, but she still crept a little closer. “A magic trick, and you play a card game with me.”

If Reid weren’t so nervous, he would have laughed. To her, he was a playmate. Not a victim, not a hostage, not an FBI agent—a playmate. “Sure, we can play a card game too.”

The child—Angeline—perked up immediately, then scampered to one of the bookshelves, running her fingers along the spines of the books. “Darcy wants us to use… this one.” She pulled out a book with a black cover with giant gold letters spelling ‘The Weeping Woman’. “The one with the shiny words on the front.”

She scampered towards him, sitting on the couch and immediately scooting up close against him. Reid winced at the unexpected contact, especially when he was wearing a bathrobe, and she immediately scooted away, not even commenting. Odd. Children her age shouldn’t be able to pick up on things like that and act on them yet.

“Um, well…” Reid held the book between them and promised himself that he’d give her some kind of affection when he was properly clothed. “How much do you know about reading? Can you sound out the words on the title?”

“Easy.” She shrugged, tracing the golden print and reading out loud without hesitation. “The Weeping Woman. A lady who’s crying, right? I _think_ that’s what weeping means.”

“Right. Weeping comes from the Old English _wepan_ , which means to shed tears, and _wepan_ itself comes from Proto-Germanic _wopijanan_ , so it—” He stopped himself, imagining Morgan or Hotch giving him a look and shushing him. _The kid doesn’t need to hear about etymology, pretty boy,_ his mental version of Morgan said.

Yet the girl didn’t seem perturbed. She was just looking up at him with interest, fingers hovering over the book.

“…You’re right, that is. Good job.” This would be easier than he thought. He opened the book, turning past the title page to a picture of three masks: two sad ones on either side of a blank one. He tapped his finger at the start of the paragraph-- _This is a story that the old ones have been telling to children for hundreds of years. It is a sad tale, but it lives strong in the memories of the people, and there are many who swear that it is true._ —and looked down at her. “You want to try this?”

She immediately scowled, pushing the book away. He took a breath to remind her of the magic trick and card game, but she didn’t make him drop it. Instead, she just yanked the book out of his hands without warning, holding it at arm’s length and squinting.

Reid frowned, and he immediately knew why she could read the title perfectly but still apparently couldn’t ‘read’.

“Angeline, you—”

She made a frustrated sound, squirming in her seat and not listening to a word he said. “This. That’s the first word.” She slammed the book shut, glaring at the golden letters on the cover. “This gives me a headache. Can I see the magic trick now?”

“Angeline, you’re an albino, right?”

She plopped the book on her knees, looking up at him and pulling her white braid over her shoulder. “You mean I’m really really white? Yeah, Darcy says he really likes that about me.”

Reid turned so he could face her, gesturing with his hands as he launched into lecture mode. “Albinism is usually caused by inheriting two recessive genes, which makes the body not produce melanin, which gives humans color in our skin, hair, and eyes. Because melanin is used as protection against UV radiation and light, albinos are more susceptible to sunburn and skin cancer, but more importantly, the eyes are heavily affected by the lack of melanin and, often, poor transmission from the eye to the brain, astigmatism, or underdeveloped optic nerves. Therefore—”

“There’s nothing wrong with me.”

It was said with the sort of certainty that an adult in denial would have. She crossed her arms, those icy eyes staring him down, and he could swear he wasn’t talking to a child. “There’s nothing wrong with me. My eyes are fine. They’re pretty and they’re fine.”

Reid blinked quizzically, fidgeting nervously. “Well, they’re, they’re very pretty, I’m not commenting on that. It’s just that, if you can’t read regular print and get headaches when you try, then you’re probably—”

“I’m _fine._ ” She stood up sharply, letting the book drop on the couch. “Let’s play that card game now.”

Reid gathered himself up, trying to think of why she would react like this. “Look, there’s nothing wrong with it. I could just talk to your father and—”

“ _No!_ ”

She spun around, her white dress swishing at her ankles, and she put her hands on her hips. “You can’t tell Darcy. I’d get in trouble.”

In trouble?

Reid frowned, cocking his head and furrowing his brow. “What do you mean?”

She sighed in frustration, as if he asked a stupid question. “If I don’t act like a lady, I get in trouble. If I don’t look perfect, I get in trouble. If there’s something wrong with my eyes and he can’t fix it, he’ll get really mad.”

Perfection. _Perfection._ It made sense—the perfectly symmetrical art, the spotless rooms, the little girl with symmetrical features and flawless complexion… the unsub had an unhealthy desire for perfection. But why?

“What do you think he’d do if he got angry?”

For a brief moment, her lower lip trembled. Then it became still again.

Emotional control. Actual emotional control that was usually possessed either by children at least twice her age, or children who are ‘gifted’ emotionally and intellectually.

“I don’t want him to get angry.”

She was abused. How so, he didn’t know, but he’d seen that look too many times to not recognize it.

His brow furrowed again. From just the first interactions, the girl displayed perceptiveness uncommon for small children, abnormally high emotional intelligence, developed verbal skills and comprehension, and the ability to compromise—which isn’t usually a concept children grasp until maybe when they were seven, and Reid would swear that this girl was closer to five or six.

Was she a victim as well as him? The concept made his heart pound in his ears—he, an adult, could handle pain, but a girl her age shouldn’t have to.

“…Well, he doesn’t _have_ to know you have sight problems.”

In the moment it took for her expression to change from stony to quizzical, he was already almost finished with a plan.

“How could you do that?”

An unsub with a need for perfection and control who has killed captives before when they attempted to escape. He could work with that. He’d find a way to work with that.

“Trust me. The last thing I want is for you to get into trouble, okay?” Reid forced another smile, but it was out of habit more than anything. He had a feeling the girl could tell the smiles weren’t real. “But first, I need to know what prescription you need. I can make an eye test quickly and test you myself.”

“And _then_ we can do the magic trick and the card game?”

“Of course. I promise.”

She scowled for a moment, thinking it over. Luckily, despite her uncommonly advanced development, she was still enough of a child to be won over by the promise of magic. She relented. 

Reid figured he could find a way out. Gain the unsub’s trust and find a way to contact the BAU, if they weren’t already triangulating his position somehow. He thought he would be out in a couple days if he wasn’t murdered.

He was wrong. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This work was beta'd by nutella4ever at Fanfiction.net. Feedback is appreciated, so please comment.

“Children have rights that adults do not have, and these rights come before the rights of adults.” Janne Haaland Matlary.

\---

“Neither of us are allowed to leave the house without Darcy’s permission. He gets mad if something happens without his permission.” Angeline navigated the part of the house left to them expertly. From what Reid gathered, the unsub often locked her and her current ‘caretaker’ in this half of the house while he was at work. Angeline still hadn’t said what the unsub did for a living, but judging by the house, it would have to be something lucrative. Maybe the head of a successful business, a private doctor, a private lawyer, or something of the like.

“What does he do when he’s mad?”

Angeline spared him a glance before pushing another door open. “Depends on who got him mad.” She gestured for him to go in ahead of her. “This is your room.”

He hesitated, pursing his lips, and then walked inside.

The room was… sterile. Clean. The white sheets and covers were new on a modern wood double bed, the wooden dresser was polished and stained the same shade of neutral golden-brown as the bed and floorboards, the bare wood floor was without any scuff marks, and there was a table besides the bed with a tall white lamp with a white lampshade. It really looked like a room in a hotel, except for two things.

One, there were no windows. Two, there were shackles on both of the bedposts at the foot of the bed.

Angeline saw where his eyes went. “You only need to wear them at night, and if he likes you, he might let you stop after a while.” She pointed at the dresser. “There are clothes in there. My room is down the hall. Come talk to me when you get dressed.”

Then she was gone. Just a swish of white as she turned away, and the door closed behind her. Reid hardly noticed.

His eyes were still fixed on the shackles.

Now that the child was gone, he allowed himself to gulp. He sat down on the edge of the hotel-like bed, hugging the foreign bathrobe closer to himself and continuing to stare. Trapped. He was trapped.

He closed his eyes, reviewing the last good memory he had of his team. JJ’s wedding, the night before they had taken the case in North Dakota. Dancing with Emily, Garcia, and JJ; sharing drinks with Hotch, Morgan, and Rossi (and getting lots of drunken hugs and pecks on the cheek when Rossi had one too many); showing Jack and Henry magic tricks and watching their eyes light up…

He reviewed every conversation he had had on that night, all the sights and sounds, the cool night air. Seeing Hotch smiling so much with Jack and Beth… Rossi warbling Italian love poetry and dancing with all the women… Garcia finally dancing with Kevin again and relaxing once more… JJ in that beautiful dress…

Once again, he tucked the memories away in his heart. He took a deep breath, then opened up the drawer.

All the clothes were nice, mainly made of silk, but were generic small sizes. He pulled on a white shirt and black pants, shivering at the feeling of the soft fabric on his skin. It felt like some of those really expensive clothes Rossi liked to give him on special occasions. (His mouth twitched at the memories of Rossi. The man _loved_ spending money spoiling his family on those occasions.)

Then, with that in place, he left the shackles behind and walked down the hall to Angeline’s room.

The door was open. Angeline’s room was a thousand times more luxurious than his own. Her room was purely white with happy lights lining the walls, a plush queen-sized bed, a large dresser with a big mirror, and a chest of drawers. Angeline, previously lying on her bed, perked up when he came in and gave him a smile.

“Hey there.” Reid stood awkwardly by the doorway, unsure of what do say, but he needed answers. “…Do you know exactly what I’m going to be doing here?”

“Take care of me.” Angeline hugged her knees. “You know. Teach me stuff, tuck me in, do my hair, things like that.”

Reid arched an eyebrow. “Do you know why you don’t have a regular babysitter to handle that?”

She shrugged, pulling at her braid and playing with it. “Darcy said they’re not good enough.”

Reid furrowed his brow. Whatever the reason, the girl wasn’t privy to it. “Two more questions, okay?”

She looked up at him, then nodded. “I’ll answer if I can.”

He swallowed, his eyes darting around her room again. There weren’t any family photographs. Not of the unsub, not of a mother, not of herself, nothing. There weren’t any photos around the house in general, for that matter. “How long was I… was I in that cell?”

His eyes finally rested on hers. Her mouth was a straight, illegible line. She remembered just as well as he did the generosity she showed. Somehow, Reid had a feeling that the unsub would not have approved.

“I don’t know.” She pushed herself off her bed, averting her eyes. “I just found out about you about a two weeks ago.”

“Two weeks?”

He’d been missing for over two weeks.

“Yeah. Something like that. It’s hard to keep track of time here.” She settled her gaze back on him. “What about the other question?”

The BAU was surely still looking for him. Morgan had hunted Doyle down for three months for the sake of revenge; they wouldn’t stop before finding one of their members if they thought he was alive. “Where are we?”

“Minnesota.” _Minnesota_ _?_ “I don’t really know more than that, though.”

She took his wrist, tugging him along behind her as she walked into the hall, but then she paused. Quietly, she asked, “Don’t tell Darcy I asked, but what’s your name?”

He looked down at the child, appraising her. Did she understand what was happening? Did she understand what it meant to have a name? “Spencer Reid.”

“Nice to meet you, Spencer. I’ll call you that when Darcy isn’t around if you promise not to tell, okay?” She squeezed his wrist. “Play with me?”

Reid bit his lower lip. He’d find a way out. When he did, he’d find a way to help the girl, too. Just as she had helped him. “Sure. Sure, I’ll play.”

\---

Reid didn’t know how much time went by before the unsub unlocked the kitchen door. It was hard to keep track of time with no clocks and few windows.

The two of them were in the media room, the room with a TV and walls lined with books, at the time. Angeline heard him first. She perked up, her eyes focused on the wall behind Reid, then she jumped to her feet, shoving Reid towards the couch and kicking the deck of cards they had been playing with under the couch. When the unsub walked into the living room, a bewildered Reid had an open book in his hands and Angeline was practically lying on his lap, focusing on the random page she had opened to.

It was a good thing she had done so. The unsub looked nothing like the (falsely) smiling man who had left them earlier.

Reid looked up at his face, careful to not make eye contact. Green eyes focused on Angeline, and the unsub made a sharp motion with his head towards the door. “Go practice your music, Angeline.”

She wiggled away from Reid immediately, jumping off the couch and going to the door. She only spared a moment to glance at the agent, her mouth set in a neutral line, before she was gone.

The unsub stared at Reid, then with one arm, grabbed the back of one of the cushioned armchairs and swung it around to face the couch—a wanton show of strength probably meant to be intimidating—and sat down. His shoulders were squared and his eyes were fixed on Reid’s, challenging him to make eye contact.

Instead, Reid’s gaze just darted along the unsub’s body. Very good, expensive clothes—a suit with a white silk shirt. Probably a designer brand, but he didn’t know enough about fashion to tell which. A shiny Rolex fastened on his left wrist. Manicured nails, large biceps, slim yet fit figure… someone who cared a lot about his appearance, and even just by the way he walked, Reid could tell he was an Alpha personality type.

“You’re not even going to look me in the eye.” The unsub leaned back in his chair, lacing his fingers together. “You’ve been thinking of getting out, haven’t you?”

“Of course I haven’t.” He had been thinking about escape since he woke up in that hole.

“Don’t lie to me.” The unsub was angry, but not horribly so. In the time he was gone, someone must have offended him. Judging by how obedient Angeline was despite her age, the unsub was probably abusive when his control or ideal of perfection was threatened. As long as Reid didn’t openly threaten his control, he should be safe. “You have been thinking about escape this whole time. Let me explain something—”

The unsub leaned forward, reaching out and grasping Reid’s wrist in a bruising grip. Reid flinched, his throat starting to close up.

“You’re not the first one. If you force my hand, you won’t be the last, either. I am a man with no limited means, and I know how to cover my tracks.” He let go of Reid’s arm, but Reid felt no safer. “As far as the FBI knows, poor Dr. Reid couldn’t handle the horror of his job anymore. He ran from his team in a Dilaudid-fueled haze, and he hasn’t returned in three weeks.”

Reid went utterly rigid.

“Dilaudid?”

How could he possibly know about that?

The unsub didn’t even smile. He leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms. “Those meetings are not as anonymous as they advertise, Doctor. The point is that your ‘team’ found a shoebox full of _your_ drug of choice under your bed with a used syringe by your pillow. I wonder what conclusions they drew.”

That touched a nerve. His addiction had been a personal battle, and it wasn’t something he had ever wanted to drag his team into. Reid’s fists clenched on his knees, and he momentarily forgot the danger he was in. “I am part of a team of FBI profilers. They _know_ I’ve been clean for years.”

“We both know that it won’t matter what they think. They are emotionally involved. What _will_ matter is what the physical evidence points to, and right now, I doubt your bosses are feeling too confident in you.”

The unsub’s eyes were hard to read. He seemed completely unaffected by Reid’s barely contained anger. “The point is that no one is looking for you. You have nothing to go back to except a job you’ll lose in a heartbeat. This can work out if you’re willing to let it.” He jerked his head towards the door. “The way I see it, there is a little girl who needs someone to take care of her. You can stay and play that role in her life, living in the lap of luxury and never having to worry about money again, or you can try to escape, get killed in the process, and be dumped at an undisclosed location where your body won’t be found for years. The choice is yours.”

He stood up, towering over Reid. The agent promised himself silently that he would find a way out of this place.

“There will be a schedule book on the kitchen table tomorrow morning. Anything you need to know about Angeline will be in there. I have work I need to handle, but I’ll be back by her bedtime to get you to your room.”

Get him to his room. Shackle him up so he’ll be utterly helpless. Reid took a deep breath.

The unsub stood, going to the door. Reid piped up just before he left, “I need contact lenses.”

“Excuse me?” The unsub had already opened the door, but he paused to glance back at Reid.

“The glasses are useful, but they’re inconvenient to maintain for long periods of time.” He adjusted them on his nose, as if to prove the point. “Daily contact lenses would be good day-to-day. I can give you my prescription.”

Or Angeline’s prescription. Either or.

The unsub arched an eyebrow, then after a moment of consideration, nodded. “Very well. Write down your prescription information and leave it on the kitchen table for me to take in the morning.”

Then the unsub was gone. Reid let out a soft sigh of relief and waited a minute until the man’s footsteps receded.

Then he began sifting through some of the information he had just gathered.

The unsub was extremely organized and had investigated his intended victim with thoroughness that would make Garcia proud. It was possible that he had also investigated the other members of the BAU, and likely that he was somehow keeping tabs on the investigation. Even if it wasn’t at an official capacity, Reid doubted his team would just accept his disappearance as a drugged runaway. Morgan alone had gone on a manhunt for months to find Ian Doyle, and that was just fueled by the desire for revenge. If there was a chance he was alive, Reid had faith that the entire team would pull out all the stops to find him. An unsub this organized would realize that and find a way to appear completely innocuous while still seeing how far the team is in the investigation.

Obviously, he had a lot of money. One could see that just by looking at the way he dressed and what his house looked like. He probably wouldn’t risk getting his hands dirty—he likely had anonymously paid off a few people and arranged for them to take Reid. If Reid were to guess, they had probably drugged him with sleeping pills then carried him out in the middle of the night. For some reason, he was willing to go through all this trouble to get a federal agent for his child.

Reid highly doubted that was the only reason. Something in this man liked proving he was smart. Liked to control things. He made a _point_ to tell Reid that he was not the first one and about how he had ruined his reputation—he liked power. He wasn’t so reckless as to directly taunt the police, but he liked the power trip he got from this. He likely hadn’t had a lot of power or control when he was growing up—maybe he was from an abusive family? It would explain why Reid hadn’t seen any family photos so far…

Or maybe he had organized crime connections. Maybe he was in a criminal family. It would make sense—people usually don’t just jump into abducting grown adults and murdering them without some criminal history, and this man obviously had the connections needed to pull it off…

There really were a lot of possibilities here. Luckily, Spencer Reid was a genius with a lot of patience. He would probably need to wait a few days to get familiar with the layout of the house and the extent of the security, but he would find a way out. He would find a way back home to Quantico.

He stood up, brushing himself off and straining his ears. Angeline would most likely be able to provide answers he needed, and the unsub had told her to ‘practice her music’. Sure enough, after a moment of listening, he could pick up the sound of a piano.

Piano. Music. The unsub wanted her to be cultured.

Reid shuffled out of the room, glancing around and attempting to navigate the half of the house left to him. Angeline hadn’t exactly given him a thorough tour—he had been more interested in asking her questions, and she… well, he supposed she was more interested in sizing him up.

Nonetheless, he explored. He found it easier to remember if he found things himself rather than with a guide. Angeline would be fine playing the piano while he investigated the house.

He weaved through the rooms without real direction, making his own mental map. As expected, the kitchen was locked again, but the fridge was stocked and there were knives put away for everything from cutting meat to slicing bread. The unsub didn’t think he’d have the courage (or ruthlessness) to try using the knives to his advantage, then.

There were few windows, and those that were around were small. This place was custom built after the unsub had Angeline, and it was made to accommodate her (apparently) severe albinism. So obviously, the unsub cared enough about her to go to vast expense to take care of her.

Yet… why hadn’t he shown any interest in her since Reid met them? Of course there was the token exchange and he was laying out a schedule Reid was meant to follow that revolved around her, but there was no… affection or love or even too much interest. The unsub left for the entire day, presumably to work, came back briefly to intimidate Reid and order Angeline to play music, and then left again. Admittedly, Reid wasn’t a parent, but he was pretty sure that parents generally liked spending a lot of time with their kids.

Reid frowned, hunting through the part of the house he was locked inside and checking the rooms. There was an exercise room, complete with very expensive equipment, and a library full of books, many of them first editions in near mint condition. All very expensive stuff, all stuff that a small child had unfettered access to. Either the unsub had so much money that the price to replace these things was irrelevant, or he trusted Angeline to not…

…That made sense. From what Reid had seen, the unsub treated Angeline like an adult. Angeline, in turn, acted much more like an adult than a child her age should. What if that was the goal?

Reid gravitated toward the library, absently running his fingers along the spines of the books. The unsub had a child with an unusual genetic condition, a genetic condition that he seemed to want her to not feel self-conscious about, since he told her that he liked it about her and he surrounded her half of the house with paintings of similarly colored men and women. Yet despite going out of his way to accommodate and provide for her, he wanted to have someone else raise her away from other children, a male FBI agent no less. What was it about Reid that screamed ‘good caretaker’? Most people in search of a caretaker kidnapped women, and women who actually had experience with children would be best. What if he was—

“What are you thinking about?”

Reid jumped at the sudden voice, spinning in place to see Angeline perched in the doorway, playing with the end of her braid. With the light filtering from the hall behind her, she looked like a spirit. He hadn’t even noticed that the music had stopped.

“Oh, I was just… looking at some of the books.” Reid awkwardly pulled his hand away from the shelf and shoved it into his pocket, shrugging his shoulders. The girl crept into the room. Reid couldn’t help but feel compelled to stare at her face. Something niggled at the back of his mind, but he didn’t have a chance to examine it.

“Darcy said you liked books.” She started walking along the bookcase towards him, her eyes fixed on his face, like she was testing him. “The last one liked books too.”

“The last one?” Reid swallowed past the nervous knot in his throat. “You mean the last one your dad got to take care of you?”

“Yeah. She liked books.” She shrugged, finally moving her gaze to the books, a fact he was somewhat grateful for. “She didn’t like me much, though.”

“Oh?” He watched her carefully. He felt like they were two animals circling each other, which seemed entirely wrong after how much she had helped him. “What makes you say that?”

“She wouldn’t play with me.” The child ran her finger along the book spines, but she couldn’t have been reading them. Most of the print was small and fancy. “And then she tried to run. Darcy told me that people only try to run when they don’t like me enough to stay, and that’s why he wanted to get a new one. Someone who would like me.”

Reid’s fingers twitched, but he swallowed the rest of his reaction. Pin her caretakers’ unhappiness to a little girl? That was… horribly cruel. Was there a purpose to that, or was the unsub merely moving the blame from himself to her?

“I don’t think it’s true they leave because they don’t like you,” Reid started tentatively, unsure of how to reassure the girl. “They probably leave because they don’t like this place.”

“What’s not to like about it? If you do what Darcy says, you never get hurt. You can have everything you want. You don’t have problems. It’s not sad like it is out there. Why go back to someplace you’ll just be hurt at? Why wouldn’t they want to stay with _me?_ ” She caught herself, looking away when her voice got higher pitched and whiny. “Sorry.”

“For what?”

“Whining.”

A small child apologizing for whining?

She flicked her braid over her shoulder and smoothed her face until it was neutral, a strangely adult expression that seemed more suited for Hotch than a child. “Do you like me, Spencer?”

The question wasn’t entirely unexpected, but it called to mind his time in that awful pit. The feeling of his fingers brushing against her wrist as she passed little treats and extra food and water to him. Once again, he felt a rush of affection, just like he had felt when he had first seen her in the light of day, but he kept it to himself.

“Yeah, I like you.” He gave her a small smile. “You don’t need to worry about that.”

Her neutral expression cracked. She gave him a shy, hopeful smile. He had to wonder how many ‘caretakers’ she had gone through, and if they were really her only company.

It couldn’t hurt to spend a little time with the girl, could it?

“H-hey, has your father ever read a book to you?” Reid looked at the bookshelves, speed-reading through the titles.

“No. The one before the last read to me, but Darcy never has.”

Reid found the perfect book. “Sit down for a second. I’ll read to you.”

Angeline cocked her head, then sat down on the ground, leaning against the side of bookshelf. Reid sat down next to her, opening up an old copy of ‘Grimm’s Complete Fairy Tales’.

He picked one of the happy stories. One of the ones that ended well and without blood. The Gold Children.

“A long time ago, there lived in a little cottage a poor fisherman and his wife, who had very little to live upon but the fish the husband caught.”

Angeline peered over his shoulder, but when she saw there were no pictures, she tried and failed to conceal a pout, leaning back against the bookshelf once more. She listened to him anyway, her eyes fixed on the ceiling.

“One day as he sat by the water throwing his net, he saw a fish drawn out which was quite golden. He examined it with wonder; but what was his surprise to hear it say,” Reid halted a moment, clearing his throat before speaking in a high-pitched voice, “‘Listen, fisherman! If you will throw me again in the water, I will change your little hut into a splendid castle.’”

At the sound of Reid’s ‘fish voice’, Angeline burst into very squeaky giggles, that neutral expression cracking into a big grin. Reid paused, looking at her with a smile, and then she stopped just as suddenly as she started.

She slapped her hands over her mouth, shrinking in place and smoothing out her expression as best as possible. “Sorry. Sorry, I shouldn’t have laughed like that.”

Reid furrowed his brow. “You don’t need to apologize, Angeline. It’s okay to laugh. That was what I was aiming for.” He looked back down at the book, peering at her through the corner of his eye. “It’s alright for a child to act childishly.”

She looked at him with clear confusion. He continued the story, voicing the characters as he went. “The fisherman replied, ‘What would be the use of a castle to me when I have nothing to eat?’ ‘On that account,’ said the gold fish, ‘I will take care that there shall be a cupboard in the castle in which, when you unlock it, you will find dishes containing everything to eat the heart can wish.’”

Angeline’s eyes were calculating again. Sizing him up. Carefully, she sidled against him, their arms touching.

She was testing him.

He didn’t flinch this time. Instead, he just flashed her a smile, then continued the story.

“‘If it is so,’ said the man, ‘then I am quite willing to do as you please.’”

Slowly, a smile crossed her face, much more permanent than the brief one her laughter caused.

“‘There is, however, one condition,’ continued the fish; ‘you must not mention to a living creature in the world, be it who it may, the source of your good fortune. If you utter a single word, it will at once be at an end.’”

She relaxed, resting her head against his shoulder. He found that he wasn’t as uncomfortable with it as he normally would be.

“The man, upon this, threw the fish back into the water, and went home. But where his little hut had once stood now rose the walls of a large castle…”

She listened quietly with a smile on her face. She hugged his arm, and he read. He read like his mother used to read to him, occasionally stealing glances towards the little child, seeing her listening with rapt attention each time.

As he read, he remembered his mother and lying in bed while she told stories.

He kept reading, concentrating on fairytales and stories about golden flowers and men and fish.

\---

_It was one of the hardest things he had ever done, sitting back and saying nothing._

_Hotch tried to hold it together, but they all could see how lost he was. Who could blame him? Reid continued to have nightmares of Haley’s dead body and Jack hiding alone with Foyet in the house, and neither of them were his family._

_Reid wanted to help. He wanted it more than anything. Yet it wasn’t his place to._

_He wasn’t frightened of Hotch. Far from it; he couldn’t help but cautiously consider the man some kind of parental figure. In some strange way, Hotch and Rossi were the patriarchs, the fathers of the rest of them. Reid didn’t pretend to understand it; he was just glad to have a family._

_It was that dynamic that rendered him incapable of pushing aside Hotch’s fragile illusion of stability. He pretended it was real. He played along. He left the pep talks to Morgan and Rossi. They were the ones better equipped to do that._

_His support was more subtle. He quietly interceded if it looked like a victim’s family or an officer was taking out their rage on his boss, tripping over his own feet or popping in with some random tangent to distract them. He took some of the files Morgan stayed late working on, working through paperwork and insisting that Morgan take the credit. He took a leaf from Garcia’s book and tried to lighten the mood of the office by playing card tricks and physics magic when he knew Hotch would see._

_His support was subtle, but he had no doubt that Hotch knew what he was doing. He was doing what he had done his whole life—quietly helping a parent up after life beat them to their knees._

_He only prayed that it was enough._

\---

“‘Ah,’ said his father, ‘we knew that your brother had been released from his trouble, for the golden lily is again erect and in full bloom.’ And after this they lived in happiness and contentment for the rest of their days.”

Reid closed the book, glancing down at the girl beside him. She was frowning, as if she were trying to puzzle out a difficult math problem.

“…Do fish normally give people babies?”

Reid laughed, but someone else spoke. “No, Angeline. Fish don’t normally give people babies.”

Reid looked up, immediately stiffening. The unsub leaned against the doorway, smiling at the girl. “It’s a fairytale. Fairytales aren’t always true.”

Angeline smiled at the unsub, but she didn’t move from Reid to hug him or anything. That was all it was. A smile. “Hi, Darcy. Didja—”

“ _Did you_ , Angeline,” the unsub cut in. “Enunciate.”

“Right.” Angeline cleared her throat while a frown danced on Reid’s face. “ _Did you_ finish that meeting?”

“Yes, I did. And I came here to see how you and the caretaker were getting along.” He turned his smile on Reid. Reid didn’t return it. “It looks like you’re getting along well.”

“I like him a lot, Darcy.” Angeline clung to Reid’s arm. He twisted just a little in her grip to give himself room to wrap his arm around her shoulders, allowing her to snuggle into his side. Even as he did it, he recognized the protectiveness that came with the gesture. For a moment, he worried that the mere act of trying to shield the child from him would set off the unsub.

Instead, the unsub’s smile just widened. He folded his arms across his chest, looking at the tiny window placed above one of the bookshelves. “It’s nighttime. You may show the caretaker around the backyard.”

“Really?!” Angeline practically bounced into a standing position, taking Reid’s hand and tugging him, beaming. “Come on! Come on! We get to go outside! Please, please swim with me!”

“Angeline,” the unsub said sharply, his expression darkening. “Restraint.”

Angeline flinched, then looked at her feet, expression smoothing, her tugs subsiding, and her voice getting softer. “I mean…”

Reid bit his lip, standing up and putting the fairytale book back in its proper place. “I’d be happy to swim with you, Angeline.”

Her mouth didn’t move, but Reid could see a shift in her eyes, a smile that she tried to hide. She offered her hand, palm facing the floor, as if she were holding it out for someone to kiss. Reid bent his knees to take it in his own. He looked at the unsub, his eyes narrowed suspiciously.

The unsub only shrugged, smiled, and gestured for Angeline to go ahead. “Ladies first, Angeline.”

She dipped her head graciously, her white braid falling past her chin, and gently tugged Reid along. This time, Reid memorized the route they took, taking note of the different paintings they passed (all depicting albino men and women, mostly women), looking at the rooms they went through, and down the stairs out of a glass door into the world outside.

The cold of the autumn night shocked his system. The grass was wet under his bare feet—it must have rained at some point that afternoon. He looked around as his eyes adjusted and Angeline continued to pull him along. She had told the truth—mounted on a platform of cement was a tall wire fence, surrounding the property. He had no doubt it was electrified.

Outside of the fence, there was thick forest with no end in sight. He glanced around, noticing that one could slip around the house. There had to be a gate—the unsub, at least, would need to get out of the house. Rubber gloves could give him the freedom to handle the gate and open it for an escape. He’d need to make sure that the glove didn’t have any holes in them—and preferably find a way to insulate them—but it could work.

“The pool’s sometimes cold, but I don’t really mind,” Angeline said, trying to keep her voice neutral and ladylike but unable to hide the enthusiasm bubbling just under the surface. Reid turned his head to look forward, noticing that the unsub had gone ahead of them.

In the fenced-in area of the yard, there was a large pool with a ladder and a diving board on the deep end. A few feet from the water sat a lawn chair with a table besides it, which the unsub sat down and reclined in. The lights lining the pool and shining from under the water threw the unsub’s sharp features into relief and making his green eyes look blue. As Angeline approached, she too was affected by the fractured light shining from the pool.

Reid couldn’t help but feel unsettled. In the light, she looked like she was dead, and the white dress settling around her ankles was her shroud.

The girl seemed oblivious to the effect of the light, though. She grabbed the hem of her gown, pulling it off with one motion, suddenly bare of anything but a pair of white panties. Reid’s eyebrows went up in surprise, but Angeline was oblivious, instead laying the dress down on the ground and then taking a running leap into the water.

She made an impressive splash for someone so tiny.

Water sprayed both men, Reid worse than the unsub. The latter sat up in his chair, scowling as the girl resurfaced. “ _Angeline._ ”

She smiled sheepishly at the unsub from the pool, pushing some hair that had escaped her braid from her face. “Sorry, Darcy.” She treaded the water, turning around to look at Reid with those big icy eyes. “C’mon—”

“ _Come on_ , Angeline.”

“ _Come on._ The water’s fine! Just take off your clothes and jump in.”

Reid bit his lip, glancing over at the unsub. He looked irritated, but he seemed to have zero interest in staring at Angeline without her clothes on, and the only way he was looking at Reid was with a small amount of impatience.

“O-okay. Just, uh, give me a minute.” Reid unbuttoned his shirt, pulling it off and shivering as the air hit his bare chest, then put it on the ground with Angeline’s dress and his own glasses. He wouldn’t take off his pants, but he would tolerate going shirtless.

He sat at the edge of the pool and slid in.

The water was warmer than he expected, but he still shivered when it enveloped him. He felt something tickling his leg, and when he looked down, he saw Angeline swimming between his legs, coming up for a breath in front of him. “Hi there! Want to play Marco Polo?”

Reid’s eyes darted to the unsub suspiciously. The unsub was just reclined in his chair, observing the people in the pool quietly.

“…Sure. Sure, I’ll start.”

He covered his eyes and heard Angeline dive underwater.

\---

_No one on the team understood it, but he still struggled with Dilaudid sometimes._

_He never touched the stuff after his initial detox. That wasn’t the problem. The problem was the cravings, burrowing into his mind like some rotten insect, spreading from his brain to his nervous system to his blood to his bones—_

_After Emily died, it was a struggle._

_So every night, once again, he found himself at JJ’s door. It was either that or his old dealer’s door. JJ always welcomed him in, but she never knew how important it was that she was there._

_She reminded him why he couldn’t go back to drugs._

_Dilaudid would only hurt his loved ones. They all already had enough pain to last a lifetime._

_Now if only he could find another way to ease the pain he already had._

\---

Reid had been right. The chains on his bed were the parts he hated the most out of this whole experience.

Every time he tried to shift, his ankles were pulled back by shackles, fixing him in place. He would not be able to move until morning, and without windows, he had no way of knowing when morning would be.

He didn’t know how long he lay there, attempting to ignore the pitch blackness driving him mad, reminding him of that hellish time in that pit and trying to drag him back, enveloping him like a monster. (It was worse without movement. Worse without counting his own footsteps.) All he knew was that it was a long time until he heard the sound of little feet behind his door.

The door opened. His heart jumped in his throat, his body trying to prepare for a potential attack but unable to move from the chains—

“Are you awake?” a little voice asked. Angeline. It was just Angeline.

Reid resisted the urge to sigh in relief. “Yeah, I’m awake.”

There was a click, and the monster was banished. The girl, once again ghostly in the dim light, held a flashlight. Reid pushed himself up on his elbows, squinting to look at her, and she crept towards the bed. “I had a nightmare.”

“A nightmare?”

How did people usually respond to that? Reid was starkly reminded of how out of his depth he was. He babysat for his godson, but he had had instructions. He had had a phone number to call. Most of all, he had had a time limit. He had none of those things here.

He wet his lips, then patted a spot on the bed. “Well, you can sit with me for a while, if you like.” He found that he’d rather she did. When there was someone else there, the darkness didn’t seem so frightening.

She didn’t need him to tell her twice. She crept to the bed and immediately crawled under the covers with him, completely oblivious to any sense of personal space and snuggling right up against his chest. Coming from a child, Reid really didn’t mind.

“Can you tell me a story, Spencer?” she asked quietly, his name a forbidden whisper, like it didn’t belong in her mouth.

“Sure.” He rested his hand on her shoulders, looking at the soft glow coming from her flashlight. “What’s your favorite kind?”

“Books.” She peered up at him from behind a curtain of loose white hair. “The nanny before last read to me. She was my favorite. Her favorite book was something about killing mockingbirds—she said she’d read it to me, but she left before she did.”

Anyone else would have told her to go dig a copy of ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ up in the library at that point. Reid didn’t have to. He remembered every book he had read word for word.

“Alright. I know which book you’re talking about. I’ll tell you the first chapter, and maybe the second if you’re still not tired. After, you need to go to bed.”

She nodded. He brushed some hair from her eyes, the ache in his ankles becoming less and less prominent, and he recalled a book he read a long time ago.

“When he was nearly thirteen, my brother Jem got his arm badly broken at the elbow. When it healed, and Jem’s fears of never being able to play football were assuaged, he was seldom self-conscious about his injury…”

Once again, he wasn’t aware of time. This time, he didn’t care.

He didn’t know when she fell asleep. He just knew that he fell asleep while reciting To Kill a Mockingbird.


	3. Chapter 3

Evgeny Baratynsky once wrote, "Providence has given human wisdom the choice between two fates: either hope and agitation, or hopelessness and calm."

* * *

Reid woke up at the sound of metal clicking against metal. His eyes snapped open and his breathing hitched; it took all the self-control he had to not yelp at the sight of a sharp, dark figure standing above him. Instead he pawed out quickly, touching the bedside table and snatching his glasses from beside the lamp, pushing them up the bridge of his nose.

"You're a light sleeper," the unsub said, not even looking at Reid's face. He unlocked the last of the shackles, and Reid had to resist the urge to hiss at the pain in his feet as feeling rushed back. The skin around his ankles was raw where the metal had rubbed against it. Reid quickly drew his legs back, all his joints cracking, and started trying to return feeling to his feet.

"What time is it?" he asked softly, trying to resist the urge to look frightened. He was glad that he wasn't waking up in the pit again, but this wasn't much better.

"Seven-thirty." The unsub didn't even need to look at his watch. Of course he didn't, Reid thought. He was anal-retentive and probably kept an extremely strict routine. "I have the prescription you left on the table, and Angeline's schedule has been left behind. Make sure she keeps to it. You should wake her up at eight."

"Eight?" Reid didn't think about it. He just blurted it out. "Don't you want to say goodbye to your daughter before leaving?"

The unsub paused. Reid immediately knew he had said something wrong.

The unsub turned sharp, dark green eyes towards Reid. The agent resisted the urge to cower and swallow nervously.

" _Don't_  call her my daughter. And don't call me her father," he said, his voice soft but his eyes anything but. "It gives her the wrong idea. And no, I don't want to say goodbye—I'll see her in the evening regardless. Don't ask questions like that again."

The unsub showed Reid the key that had been used to open his shackles, then he put it in his pocket. He was wearing a very sharp suit with nary a wrinkle on it. He was just as anal-retentive about his clothing as he was about his house. "Eight o'clock. Make sure you wake her up and her hair is neat."

The unsub smoothed his suit, and without another word, he left. Reid couldn't help but wonder… was the unsub actively avoiding too much interaction with Angeline?

And if he wasn't her father, then what was he?

Reid swallowed nervously, rubbing his ankles and helping them regain feeling. Light escaped into his otherwise pitch black room from the open door, and despite his reservations, he knew he wouldn't get anything done just by sitting on his bed. He took a deep breath, giving the unsub time to get out of this half of the house, and then pushed himself off the bed.

He staggered at first, his feet peppering him with pins and needles, and caught himself on the wall. He had to give himself another moment to work feeling back into the limbs, frowning.

Angeline must have left his bed in the middle of the night. Probably for the best, since he didn't want the unsub to think that she had been out of her room after bedtime. Reid shook his head, pushing some hair from his eyes, and walked quietly to the kitchen. It disturbed him how easily he remembered the direction.

There was a thick planner on the table, opened up to a specific page. Reid nervously fingered the hem of his pajama shirt and sat down to look at it.

_8:00 – Wake Angeline_

_8:01 – Make Angeline brush her teeth and wash her face_

_8:05 – Brush Angeline's hair and braid it_

_8:15 – Give Angeline a breakfast of two scrambled egg whites and one half a cup of yogurt with three chopped strawberries_

_8:30 – Get Angeline dressed_

_8:40 – Sit her in the media room and make her recite her multiplication tables, squares, and cubes_

_8:50 –_

And so on and so forth. Reid cocked his head, frowning at the schedule. It made sense for an unsub this anal retentive to have such a detailed plan for the day, but what really surprised him was a five- to six-year-old being asked to recite exponents. And the endings to her Latin declensions, conjugations, and tenses, apparently. And every war the United States had been involved in during its history, regardless of obscurity. And… a lot of other things Reid really wouldn't expect from a normal kindergartener. That was just what Reid himself was expected to do.

Apparently, she had a home etiquette lesson scheduled for ten to twelve, a dancing lesson scheduled for one to three, a singing lesson scheduled for three to five, and a piano lesson scheduled for five to seven. From 8:40 to ten and seven to eight, Reid was expected to handle things like arithmetic, Latin, science, history, and reading. It was all ridiculously detailed scheduling that could give Rossi a run for his money.

Reid shook his head, putting the book aside for reference. If he was going to escape this place, he'd have to take the time to observe security and the unsub's habits. Until he had enough surveillance time, he would need to go along with this schedule.

So. Getting a child out of bed and prepared for the day.

What could go wrong?

He sighed and stood up, running a hand through his hair. He really,  _really_  wished that JJ or even Hotch were with him right now. They'd know what to do.

Reid padded quietly to the little girl's room, once again remembering exactly where to find it. He opened the door, and his eyes had to adjust to the darkness inside. There was a tiny window on the far side of the room, but it was practically opaque and didn't allow for much light. In the beam the hallway lights cast, he could see Angeline. Her skin and hair practically blended into the sheets, so he had difficulty picking her out in the darkness at first.

…How does one go about waking a child up?

"Uh… Angeline?" he tried, creeping over the threshold. "Time to wake up."

She stirred, but instead of jumping out of bed, she buried her face further in the pillow. "Mph."

"Is that all I get? 'Mph'?"

She pulled the blanket over her head.

Reid smiled, padding to the bed and sitting on the edge beside her. "Come on, it's time to wake up." He fidgeted with his hands in his lap, unsure of what to do with them. Should he touch her? Would that be inappropriate? "You have a big day, you know."

She didn't respond. He decided to avoid touching her, preferring that she initiate contact if it were to be had, so he racked his brains for ideas. What did she respond to yesterday?

"I'll tell you a story if you get up?"

There was a pause, then she peeked over the edge of her blanket, her eyes narrowed suspiciously. "What kind?"

"A fairytale." He gave her a smile. "The Twelve Brothers. I'll tell it to you after you've brushed your teeth and washed your face."

There was another pause, but the allure of a fairytale was too great. Angeline pushed back the covers reluctantly and slid out of bed, her white hair tousled and mussed from a night of tossing and turning. Reid couldn't help but notice how… cute it looked. It made him want to laugh for some inexplicable reason.

She trudged off to the bathroom. He turned on the light in her room, squinting as the darkness was banished, and started searching around for a hairbrush and a hair tie. By the time Angeline came back in, her bed had been made and Reid was sitting on top of it with a brush and hair tie in his lap.

"Teeth brushed and face washed."

She crawled onto the edge of the bed in front of him, presenting him her hair. "Story, please!"

"Alright, alright, a promise is a promise," Reid laughed softly, picking up the hairbrush. He didn't quite know what to do—he had never really brushed another person's hair before. Should he just do it like he does to himself, or is there a trick?

He started with running his fingers gently through her hair. It felt very soft, just like down. "Once upon a time, there lived a King and Queen very peacefully together; they had twelve children, all boys."

He ran the brush through her hair, watching as the strands separated, then came back together, the tangles of the night undoing themselves.

"Now the King said to the Queen one day, 'If our thirteenth child should be a girl, the twelve boys shall die, so that her riches may be the greater, and the kingdom fall to her alone.'"

Angeline relaxed under his touch. It felt strange, but not unpleasant. She didn't squirm or complain or push—she just allowed him to work out the tangles patiently.

"Then he caused twelve coffins to be made, and they were filled with shavings, and a little pillow laid in each, and they were brought and put in a locked-up room, and the King gave the key to the Queen, and told her to say nothing about it to anyone."

Reciting the story verbatim to how it was written in the book of Grimm Fairytales was simple to him, and Angeline didn't comment on his memory. Her eyes remained fixed ahead of her, and Reid split her hair up into three sections. Braiding. How hard could it be?

"But the mother sat the whole day sorrowing, so that her youngest son, who never left her, and to whom she had given the Bible name Benjamin, said to her, 'Dear mother, why are you so sad?' 'Dearest child,' answered she, 'I dare not tell you.'"

From the little profile he was already building of this particular unsub, Reid knew that he would be equally anal retentive about Angeline's hair as he was about everything else. He measured in his head, trying to make the three sections somewhat equal to one another. Then, he started pulling them together. He hadn't really braided for… well, he didn't remember the last time he braided something. Probably when he was a child.

"But he let her have no peace until she went and unlocked the room, and showed him the twelve coffins with the shavings and the little pillows. Then she said, 'My dear Benjamin, your father has caused these coffins to be made for you and your eleven brothers, and if I bring a little girl into the world you are all to be put to death together and buried therein." And she wept as she spoke, and her little son comforted her and said, 'Weep not, dear mother, we will save ourselves and go far away.'"

His inexperience showed through. Locks of hair came loose, strands slipped from his fingers, pieces of the braid bulged out to the sides—Angeline didn't say a word, but she reached back and swatted his hands away, apparently able to feel how wrong he was doing it. Then she ran her hands through her hair, undoing his work, and sat still once again. She knew as well as he did that it had to be perfect.

"Then she answered, 'Yes, go with your eleven brothers out into the world, and let one of you always sit on the top of the highest tree that can be found, and keep watch upon the tower of this castle. If a little son is born I will put out a white flag, and then you may safely venture back again; but if it is a little daughter I will put out a red flag, and then flee away as fast as you can, and the dear God watch over you. Every night will I arise and pray for you—in winter that you may have a fire to warm yourselves by, and in summer that you may not languish in the heat.'"

He brushed, sighing inwardly, and divided up her hair into another three sections.

"After that, when she had given her sons her blessing, they went away out into the wood…"

* * *

It took a lot longer than the prescribed ten minutes to finish Angeline's hair. Reid's fingers ached and if he ever had to braid another thing, it'd be too soon.

But it was over, thank God, and Angeline hadn't squirmed the whole time. The story appeased her while she wordlessly informed him that his work wasn't good enough until it was.

So, because of the setback in time, Reid asked Angeline to rattle off her multiplication tables, squares, and cubes while he made her breakfast, and then her Latin endings while she pulled on her clothes, and then the Periodic table and wars in American history while they waited for her etiquette teacher to come.

Reid… really didn't know what to expect. He knew that the unsub was too organized to allow someone near Reid unless he was sure they would keep their mouth shut about him having a kidnapped federal agent. They would probably be someone who had also met Angeline's previous 'caretakers' and were aware of how important it was that they not reveal the nature of their employer to anyone—the teachers were all probably bought off.

It didn't really come as a surprise when the etiquette teacher avoided his eyes the whole lesson.

The teacher—a middle-aged man with precise facial symmetry—simply accepted Angeline's introduction for Reid ('Mr. Abel, this is the new caretaker.') with a nod and a curt, "Good to meet you. I'm the etiquette teacher." After that, Reid could count the words 'Mr. Abel' said to him on one hand. Reid stayed out of the way and just watched the lesson unfold.

The same pattern repeated at each lesson. ('Ms. Turner, this is the new caretaker.' 'Hey there, I'm the dance teacher.'; 'Mr. Thompson, this is the new caretaker.' 'Afternoon. I'm the singing teacher.'; 'Mrs. Thern, this is the new caretaker.' 'Hello. I'm the piano teacher.')

Consistently, none asked for his name. Consistently, they introduced themselves by their occupation, not by anything else. Consistently, none of them could meet his eyes the whole time they were there.

He didn't confront them. Not yet, at least. He had to know more before he risked appealing to their better natures in case they went to the unsub with his attempt to escape. If he were being honest, he would also admit that he wanted to give his team a little more time before he risked his life. He trusted in their skills completely—the fact that they hadn't found him yet was frightening, but he knew that they were the best at their jobs, and if anyone could find him, it'd be them.

Now if only they would find him.

* * *

_People would frequently comment that he must think he was so much better than everyone else because of his intellect. They would sneer at his perceived arrogance, trying to hide the jealousy in their eyes. The truth was, he hardly noticed the deficit between the intelligence of him and others most of the time._

_His genius was more in capacity than in a specific kind of thinking. He was able to hold knowledge better—where other people had cracked porcelain minds that would occasionally leak, he had solid, waterproof steel. He was able to hold knowledge and he was able to access it to a greater extent than others. He had no skills that weren't possessed by everyone else; he just happened to be better at a lot of them._

_So really, it always caught him by surprise when he went on one long tangent, only to turn around and see everyone staring blankly at him. It was then that he was reminded of the difference between himself and others, and he felt completely alone._

_His team almost never looked at him like that. They would glare, roll their eyes, smile, laugh, lean forward to listen closer—a range of reactions that would make him feel like he was on their level. Like they understood what he was saying. Like he wasn't alone._

_Intellectually, he knew that he was the teammate with the highest IQ. In practice?_

_He always felt like they were just as smart as he was._

* * *

Three days. He had been out of the pit, taking care of Angeline for three days. He didn't mind spending time with her; she was a smart girl, eager to play with him and happy to listen to his occasional tangents. To be honest, if she were the daughter of a friend or a neighbor, he would have looked forward to seeing her. Instead, he was here against his will.

Not for much longer, he had decided on the second day. No matter the risk, he was not going to just sit and wait to be rescued.

Also, Angeline's piano teacher deserved a medal.

"Have you ever played before?"

Reid was settled in a chair beside the piano, watching the child's ghostly white hands dance along the keys. He could already tell that there were many hours put into learning the piano, possibly since she was capable of understanding exactly what it was. He looked down at her face when she asked the question, a small smile coming to his face. "I started teaching myself a little while ago."

"Do you know any songs?" she asked, her eyes going to Reid's face as her fingers continued pressing keys. She wasn't playing a song Reid recognized, but judging from the sound of it, he was guessing that it was from very early in the Romantic Era, most likely a piece by Pinto. Fast pace, but somewhat melancholic tune. "Darcy will only let Mrs. Thern teach me songs he likes to hear. She's mentioned that there are other kinds of songs besides this."

Reid arched an eyebrow, frowning. "Yeah, there are plenty of different genres of music. Move over and I'll play something for you."

Angeline scooted to the side, giving him room to sit beside her. He sat down, resting his fingers against the keys. "This is called Greensleeves. It's a folk song."

He started to play, his eyes fixed on what his fingers were doing. He had no problem remembering exactly how to play, but he needed to watch his hands to see he would hit the right notes. The melancholic, wistful tune always brought Reid back home with his mother, listening to the sound of it crooning from a radio as his mother read him old Christmas stories and the lights of Las Vegas dimmed outside.

There was routine here. If it weren't for the chains and isolation, it would feel like a regular household. Maybe it would even remind him of his own home.

But the routine wasn't normal. Lessons, lessons, lessons, with most of the general education covered by a genius with zero teaching experience. No friends. No outside activities except after the sun had set. At night, it was always the same—dinner with Angeline and the unsub, going outside to play or swim, getting chained to his bed, and then Angeline would disappear with the unsub for a half hour (the first night he realized where she was going, he feared abuse, but his subtle questioning of the girl yielded no evidence of it), only to come back to his room, begging for another chapter of To Kill a Mockingbird.

It was stifling. The isolated captivity was stifling.

Angeline watched his hands. His green and yellow bracelet hung loosely on his bony wrist, drawing his eyes. He hadn't taken it off since he had gotten out of the pit; despite the utter lack of logic, he felt safer with it on.

"It's a pretty song." Angeline placed her hands on her knees, a small smile on her face. "Really pretty."

Reid gave her a smile, continuing to play. "Watch me and I can teach you how to play it."

She shifted closer to him, watching his hands closely. He didn't even need sheet music to play the song—he was so familiar with it that his hands just danced on the keys. Admittedly, he had to keep a much closer eye on his own hands than Angeline had, but he had only just started to learn.

"What's that thing on your wrist?"

He paused in his playing, watching as she pointed at the Orula's Ide. After half a beat, he continued playing. "It's something called an Orula's Ide. A… friend gave it to me, once. It's traditional for Palo Mayombe—it's meant for protection."

Angeline gave him a quizzical look, beginning to stop paying attention to the music in favor of the bracelet. "Bracelets don't protect you. And what's Palo Mau… Moyo… Mala…"

"Palo Mayombe," Reid interrupted gently, removing his hands from the keys as he finished the song. "It's a religion with mainly Latino and Central African roots. A Babalawo—basically, a priest of Palo Mayombe—gave it to me, which in their tradition, means that he has passed the protection that belonged to him onto me."

If anything, Angeline looked even more confused by the explanation.

"…You can be something other than Catholic or Protestant?"

Reid arched an eyebrow. "Oh, oh yeah, there're a lot of different religions. Christianity is definitely the most popular, but it's far from the only religion there is, or even the oldest."

He face was the embodiment of a question mark. Reid caught himself making a mental note to teach her about things  _besides_  academics.

Angeline cocked her head, pulling her braid and fiddling with it as she thought. "Then what are you?"

His brow knit together. "W-well…" He knew what he would say to an adult, but to a child? "I'm not… I'm not really anything. I don't really, you know, believe in any higher power."

"People can do that?" Her eyes became the size of ping pong balls. "I thought believing was a thing everyone was supposed to do!"

"Well… you know, Angeline, belief is a personal thing. It's… it's really just about what you choose." He fiddled with the edge of his sleeve. He really didn't know how to have these kinds of conversations with children. "And you don't—most children believe what their parents believe, and that's okay. You don't need to think about that now."

She furrowed her brow, although it was a little hard to tell since the color of her eyebrows blended in with the color of her skin. Then she looked back down at the bracelet, reaching out and fingering the green and yellow beads. "Do you believe this'll protect you?"

Reid shrugged, suddenly feeling the impulse to wrap his arm around her shoulders and hug her. "I don't know. There's no—there's no reason for me to wear it, but it, it makes me feel better. Sometimes adults do things that don't make sense." He compromised with his strange biologically wired impulse. He reached out and gently tucked a lock of hair that had fallen in the girl's face behind her ear. "I'm going to get started on dinner. You keep practicing and I'll be back soon."

She nodded, giving him a small smile. Despite the circumstances, he couldn't help but smile back.

She looked back down at the piano and started playing. He started fiddling with the hem of his sleeve again before getting up and leaving the room. He didn't intend to go to the kitchen. He didn't intend on spending another minute imprisoned against his will.

He knew exactly where the backdoor was. It was the door he and Angeline used to go outside after dark. There was a timed lock on it that only undid itself during the approved time for Angeline to be outside—but machines are fallible. It had really been a matter of finding something that could act like a screwdriver and loosen the screws while the unsub and Angeline weren't looking, and then to find a spare pair of rubber gloves to cut up and use to grip tweezers to make makeshift pliers, and scissors to make makeshift wire cutters. He didn't know what the unsub's schedule was—he had no way of knowing from being trapped in only half the house with minimal contact—but he just had to pray that he left the house for work. It would have been better to leave during midday, but he couldn't risk running away when one of Angeline's tutors could notice.

So he huddled by the door, taking his 'pliers' out of his pocket and pulling the loose casing off of the mechanical lock. He may not have been too good with computers, but he didn't have a PhD in engineering for nothing. It took about three minutes to cut and rearrange the wires properly. That was the easy part.

Reid took a deep breath, then opened the door.

It took him a moment to remember that he hadn't felt raw sunlight on his skin in over a month. He never realized how much he loved the warmth spreading across his face, forcing him to squint his eyes as they adjusted. For a moment, it felt like all his worries had gone away.

And then they sunk back in, turning his stomach to lead. He had to move. He had to move  _now._

He put the pliers back in his pocket and slunk around the corner of the house, every sense on alert. He gave the area a visual sweep—he saw a driveway leading out of a closed gate, but no car. Hopefully, it would stay that way.

Reid took a deep breath, then quickly ran to the fence, taking out the scissors and kneeling on the ground. His throat constricted, but his hands were surprisingly steady as he started working on the wire mesh. He couldn't outright cut the mesh with scissors, even ones with rubber grips, so he instead compressed small areas of the wires until pieces could be snapped off. After that, he quickly started unraveling the little links in the fence, his hands working faster than he remembered ever doing before.

His knuckles ached from holding his tools so hard. He could feel the blood rush in his ears. It felt like it took forever to undo a single link, but he couldn't be discouraged. He had to escape. He had to get help. He had to find his team. He had to get away.

The hole was growing. It needed to be bigger, though—he had to make sure that he wouldn't—

He heard a familiar sound of wheels rolling over gravel. Reid's head snapped up, his eyes getting wide. A car was starting to come down the driveway.

That hole had to be big enough.

Reid dropped his tools and went on his stomach, wriggling on the ground into the hole. The grass scraped against his stomach, smearing his shirt green. He briefly felt the metal of the fence scrape against the back of his neck, drawing a deep scratch from his hairline to the nape, but he ducked his head, whimpering softly in fear and continuing to wiggle whilst praying that he wasn't touching a piece of metal.

The grinding of wheels ceased.

His torso cleared the fence.

His heart pounded in his ears.

There was the sound of a car door shutting.

His knees cleared the fence.

Reid dug his fingers into the dirt, then yanked himself onto his feet and  _sprinted._

He had no shoes on. There hadn't been any provided at the house. He ran into the woods, the twigs and rocks cutting into the soles of his feet, branches tugging at his hair and clothes. He could hear shouting behind him. The unsub was back.

A great rock loomed in front of him, starting an incline onto a hill. He stepped on, scrambling up the mossy surface. He dug his fingers into the moss, scraping them against the rock and tearing open the scabbed tips. He started bleeding, splashes of red staining the green even after the rock ended and forest floor began, but he couldn't stop. He had to keep moving.

Breath started coming in ragged gasps. His foot caught on a root, sending him flying onto the ground. He felt something scrape his cheek, a burst of warmth telling him that he was bleeding, and dirt smeared his face. He pushed his bloody fingers into the leaves and brush to pull himself up again, and then he was running once more.

There was a thin scream behind him, but he hardly processed it. His mind whirred, searching for a way to get away, because he  _knew_  that he couldn't run forever, and he could only—

Suddenly, he felt blinding pain in his leg.

He shouted and fell to the ground. Spots danced in his eyes, blackening his vision completely for two horrible seconds. There was pain and awful pressure on his leg, and it only took a glance to see what it was.

His leg was caught in an animal trap. It looked like a bear trap sans teeth; most likely a coyote trap. The bone was shattered.

The only thing he could think as he struggled to not pass out from shock was that he was going to die there, trapped like an animal on the forest floor.

"Darcy! Darcy, no!"

Angeline.

No. No no no. Reid didn't want her to see this. He had no doubt that he would be murdered; why would he have to add onto an innocent girl's trauma with it?

He propped himself up on his hands, glancing back. The movement sent shooting pain through his mangled leg, making his breath catch as he gasped. There were thundering footfalls. The unsub.

"Darcy! Please!"

The brush parted. The unsub looked angrier than Reid had ever seen him, brandishing a baseball bat. Angeline stumbled at his heels, the sunlight reflecting off her skin making her blinding. Reid fixed his eyes on her hands, fluttering like white dragonflies out in front of her, small and graceful. He'd rather look at her hands than at the unsub or the bat. Her fingers spread, the dragonflies showing their iridescent wings, and they grabbed at the unsub's jacket. "Please, no! Not this one! Not again!"

Reid didn't look at the unsub. He didn't have to. From the shadows cast on the Angeline's dress, he could see the man raise his bat.

He screwed his eyes shut and hoped with all his heart that his mother would be okay without him.

Pain exploded in his head as the bat cracked against his temple. The air was punctured by the earsplitting shriek of a terrified little girl. Even through the pain, the sound made Reid open his eyes, but the impact on his skull had rendered him blind.

"Angeline! Get back into the house!"

His sight filtered back in, only to see that the unsub was holding the screaming girl still by her braid. Reid tried to prop himself up on his hands again, but his arms collapsed under him, the pain in his head and leg making his eyes water.

"No! No!" She thrashed in the unsub's grip, her face red from the sun and wet with tears. "Not again! Not another one!"

Reid clenched his fists on the ground, leaves pressing against his palms, head pounding and leg going numb. He had to gather strength to work through the dizziness to breathe out, "Angeline." He shook his head, then had to rest his cheek against the forest floor at the vertigo it caused, and the frame of his glasses bit into his cut. "Don't watch this."

"NO!" If anything, his plea only increased her thrashing. "NOT AGAIN! NOT ANOTHER ONE!"

It seemed like Reid could  _feel_  the unsub snap. In one vicious motion, the grip on Angeline's braid was tightened and then she was thrown on the ground. Reid didn't have time to process before the unsub fell to his knees, rage in his eyes, and pressed his thumb against Reid's carotid artery.

Reid wondered if he would die in the arms of unconsciousness. It seemed more comforting, but less fair, somehow. Despite the fear, he wanted to know when he would die.

He fell unconscious.

* * *

_Reid had never really been babied. His father had started his slow separation when he was four, and his mother's declining mental health meant that she couldn't take care of him. He didn't really know how to baby someone because he didn't have any experience on either side of the equation._

_So to be honest, he hadn't the slightest clue what to do with Henry when he let it sink in that he was a godfather._

_He knew he loved the boy. His heart swelled when he saw him, his pupils dilated, and he smiled without realizing he was doing so. He didn't need to study his own reactions to realize how he felt. He just didn't know how to express that._

_At first, he did what came to him instinctively. He carefully held the baby close when he had an opportunity to and cooed softly. JJ, Hotch, and Garcia guided him the rest of the way._

_When Henry was weaned to a bottle, JJ taught Reid how to feed him. When Reid didn't know how to amuse him, Garcia was the one to suggest games like peek-a-boo and tickling. When he didn't know how to deal with anxiety that just comes with being even moderately responsible for a child, Hotch talked to him about it. Reid knew that he wasn't an actual father, that the nervousness was a lot worse for Will, but Hotch treated his concerns as though they were legitimate and soothed him in a way only an experienced father could._

_Yet it was Henry who really taught him how to deal with children._

_He volunteered to babysit his godson because he wanted to spend time with him. When JJ left him in the house, he didn't know what to do. He froze, and for a moment, he thought he would have to call JJ and tell her that he couldn't do it._

_Then Henry, little toddler Henry, tugged him to the couch, turned on the TV, and snuggled up to his side._

_With his arm wrapped around the boy's shoulders and his fingers tangled in his godson's curly blond hair, he felt at peace. He had faith in his own instincts, in the biological wiring that guided every single living creature in the care of a child._

_So for the first time, he felt confident that he could care for his godson._

* * *

When Reid came to, he prayed that he would pass out again. The pain in his leg and head was unbearable, and the old enemies of a hollowing stomach and drying throat were lurking closer. There was no light, and any attempt to move was met by resistance at his ankles. He was chained. He was lying down on a bed and chained.

The darkness started to sink back into the cracks and seams of his body, and this time, there was no child to save him.

This time, the ghost of death settled at his side, and he couldn't make it go away before he faded out again.

* * *

_Seeing Morgan's eyes as he locked the door between them was the worst part. He knew it had to be done—the anthrax was circulating through the air, and if Morgan had stepped inside, he would have been infected as well—but that didn't mean he was prepared for the look Morgan gave._

_It was a look that said 'I failed to protect you.'_

_Reid found himself staring back, unsaid words on the tip of his tongue._

_'I failed to protect_ myself. _'_

* * *

He faded in and out. His body began to waste away again. It was worse being chained to one place—he couldn't walk, couldn't count his steps, and was forced to lie in his own filth. There was no water, no food, no light.

He was dying.

* * *

_His mother still had her moments. She still had times when she would stare blankly beyond him, seeing things he hoped he'd never see._

_But she was getting better. Better, but not perfect. He knew she wouldn't be able to take care of herself. That was why he wouldn't take the steps to allow her to reclaim independence. She was sick. He knew her and the illness well enough to know that she wouldn't keep taking medication if she were out of the sanitarium._

_He hated himself for it, sometimes. It felt like he betrayed her. He betrayed her when he was the only person left who she loved._

* * *

As he came closer and closer to death, his dreams became more vivid. Dreams of his team, usually. The people he loved.

A popular dream that kept reoccurring was one where he was twelve again, barely out of high school, and he wanted to climb a big tree that stood in the middle of a field, because he knew that if he climbed to the very top of that tree, he would be able to touch the moon and sun and stars. He could never climb the tree alone, though.

Then Derek would appear at the base of the tree. He would smile, tease him, call him 'pretty boy', and then pick him up from his waist and plop him right on the first branch, encouraging him to go higher. JJ would be on the next branch up, and she would hold down her hand, helping him climb up to her.

After that, Emily would be sitting at the branch above JJ, her feet dangling and her eyes laughing, and she would tell him to grab on her ankles and she'd kick him up. He always knew that that shouldn't work, but his trust for her overrode his common sense, and he always held onto her feet with his little twelve-year-old hands.

She would kick him up. He'd fly through the air, up branch after branch, and just after he peaked and started to fall, he was caught by Rossi, the man grumbling about being too old for this and that kids should stop listening to Emily. Then Rossi would pass him up another branch, into the warm arms of Garcia. She would hug him tightly, his tiny child form enveloped in her embrace, and she would call him nicknames and reassure him that he was almost there.

Then she would pass him up to the next branch, and Hotch would help him up by his hand, his lips quirked in a rare smile, and without a word, he would pick Reid up and place him at the top of the tree.

The sun, moon, and stars would all be there for the touching. When he touched the sun, it turned into Henry, and Henry would fall into his arms, and Reid would suddenly be an adult again, holding a godson who radiated heat and burst with light. When Reid touched the stars, they became Jack, and Jack would also fall into his arms, eyes bright and mouth fixed in a grin. When Reid touched the moon, it became Angeline, and she was the last to fall into his arms, and she would be asleep in his embrace, snuggled with the other children and glowing softly in a world that was now without any light source but her, Henry, and Jack.

Then Reid would always realize that he was much too high and the children weren't safe. He looked down, looking to pass the children to Hotch to pass to Garcia and so on, but his whole team was gone. The branches were losing leaves quickly, and he was all alone.

Then all the children would break from his arms, standing on a branch in a row, and he would be twelve again.

Somehow, he knew that he would have to climb down alone, but he was too scared to.

The other children weren't scared, though. One by one, each turned their head to give him a toothy grin, and then stepped off of the branch into the air.

* * *

_"Okay, Reid, we gotta divvy up the godparent duties, alright?"_

_Reid looked up from the book he was two seconds (and five hundred words) from finishing to see Garcia sit next to him, wielding a pink pen with a feather on top and a pink notepad. "E-excuse me?"_

_"Don't give me that, my gorgeous gray matter! We are now officially the godmother and godfather of Henry—we've gotta figure out who does what, like who sneaks him candy when his parents aren't looking, who sits him down and tries to explain his parents' side of arguments, who takes him out and spoils him rotten, so on and so forth."_

_She licked her finger and flipped open the notepad, immediately writing things down in bright purple pen while Reid looked on quizzically. "I was thinking that I could be the fun one and you'd be the one who'd be all 'learning is fun!' and help him out with his homework when Will or JJ is at a loss or something. You know, the helpful one that he could use as a role model."_

_Reid's brow knit itself together and he straightened up in his seat, closing the book in his lap. "Garcia, doesn't he have a father for that?"_

_Garcia shot him an exasperated look over her pen as she scribbled. "My darling, little boys and girls need more than one role model. Will gets to be the 'strong, New Orleans cop' role model, and you get to be the 'pretty Einstein from Las Vegas' role model. Oh, oh, speaking of which, even though I'm the fun one, you should probably be the one to teach him poker and blackjack and stuff like that. You know it better than anyone."_

_"…Does JJ know that you're doing this?" Reid cocked his head, his eyes squinting a little in thought._

_Garcia grinned at his apparent naïveté and reached out to pinch his cheek. Ow. "Aw, you're cute. Of course she knows. It's in the parent book of rules to have a cool aunt to spoil the kids and a nice uncle to run to when Mom and Dad are being Mom and Dad. They don't have brothers and sisters, so we're the next best thing!"_

_…Reid hadn't the slightest clue if that was actually a thing. He'd be sure to ask Morgan or Emily about it._

_"Now then!" Garcia's grin could have powered all of Quantico. "Back to planning!"_

* * *

An eternity later, his life sputtering out before his eyes, the darkness was suddenly banished. A light was turned on, confirming his suspicions—he was chained on the bed he had been given.

For the first time, he wished that the darkness would come back. The light hurt his eyes and sent shocks of pain through his aching head. He wanted to return to sleep.

Darcy loomed in the doorway. Once again, he was tightly controlled. His mouth was fixed in a frown and his eyes were narrowed in disgust. "You brought this on yourself."

He stalked across the room, taking a familiar key from his breast pocket and unlocking the shackles around Reid's ankles (and, Reid was finally able to confirm, someone had put his broken leg in a cast).

"You brought this on yourself  _and_  Angeline."

That broke him a little out of his fog. Angeline? Angeline was hurt?

Darcy wrinkled his nose at Reid, then left the room briefly, coming back just to shove a wheelchair towards the bed. Reid only had the strength to flinch when the wheelchair hit the side of the bed.

"Clean this damn place up."

Then Darcy was gone, slamming the door behind him.

Reid was ashamed to say that he seriously considered just lying back and letting himself fade away. His muscles were weak, his body hollow, and his throat dry as sand. For the third time that month, he was so close to dying that he could practically touch it—surely, after the third time, he wouldn't be bad for simply letting it reach out and take him?

But Angeline.  _Angeline._  She was hurt, and she was just a little girl. If Reid survived, he could live to make sure she was okay. If he didn't, who would?

He took a deep breath, then forced his bony hand to reach out and grasp the smooth metal handle of the wheelchair. It hurt every bone in his body to move.

He took a deep breath, then swung his legs over the side of the bed. He forced himself to straighten out, holding the wheelchair for support. The chair wobbled, ready to roll out from under him, but he somehow managed to keep it under him. Water, food, and shower. He'd handle all that, then clean the room.

Hunger made his stomach shudder on itself, but water was the more immediate need. He hadn't exactly been active for however long he was in the room, so he had managed to conserve what water he had, but he still needed to rehydrate before anything else.

Reid carefully started to limp, using the wheelchair as a crutch. If he sat down, he didn't know if he would stand up again.

It felt like he was walking through a dream. Every step was an uncertain shambling, ever movement of the eye sluggish and unfocused. Despite his uncertainty, he made it to the bathroom, hobbling in and not even having the presence of mind to lock it behind him.

He didn't look in the mirror. He didn't want to see himself. Instead, he let go of the wheelchair, his need for water overwhelming his need for stability, and he collapsed against the sink, turning on the faucet and putting his mouth directly to the tap, drinking greedily for the first time in he didn't know how long. Every contraction in his throat hurt, and it felt like every gulp was just another commitment to try to live. More and more, the ease with which he could just fall to the ground and let the shade overtake him became easier to put aside. The knowledge was there, haunting him, but it felt less like he had to give in.

It felt like his thirst would never be sated, but it was. It was, and he finally withdrew, holding onto the running faucet with both hands as he slumped against it and rested his hot forehead against the cool sink, water running over his hair.

Vivid dreams of trees and the sky almost overtook him again, enticing him back to sleep, promising him a place where he wouldn't be afraid or in pain. He might have even allowed himself to slink back into that place if it weren't for the cold water dripping down the part of his hair and wetting his scalp.

Time passed as he gathered his strength. Finally, he raised his head, the water dripping down his neck and wetting his shirt, and he glanced around the bathroom. Someone, presumably Darcy, had left a trash bag hanging on the doorknob. He'd need that for his cast. And his glasses were left on the counter beside him. He turned off the water, then grasped the edge of the sink, using it as support as he peeled off his soiled clothes. He had the vaguest sense of déjà vu, but this felt… wrong, somehow. Worse. Last time this had happened, he had been strong and ready to find a way out. Now… he didn't even know what he was.

Now naked, he let go of the sink, grasping instead the arm of the wheelchair again. It was slow going, hobbling to the door. Every step hurt, and his body would not stop calling for him to lie back down. He did his best to shake the thoughts off, but they kept pulling at him.

He got to the door. He grabbed the bag, pulling it up his leg to a little above the knee and tying it. His fingers curled around the arm of the wheelchair again, and he slowly hobbled to the shower.

The hot water finally banished the shade following him.

It felt like some inner eyelids had finally opened. He let out a slow, rattling breath, letting the water wash over him and cleanse all the filth from his body. He still felt weak, but he felt alive. He felt human. At least that.

At least that.

When he started to finally wash himself, he allowed himself to think about Darcy's comment. Angeline. Had Angeline been hurt?

Angeline was alive. She  _had_  to be. Darcy didn't have a reason to keep him alive if she wasn't. But he knew that Angeline had feared Darcy's ire, probably because of past abuse—what had her desperate protection of her caretaker done to her? That must have been the reason Reid was still alive. She was the only part of the equation that  _didn't_  immediately add up to him being murdered.

That little girl saved him again.

Now she had been punished for it.

He washed the filth and death and darkness from his body, letting it all wash down the drain. He scrubbed his skin until it bled, the scabs that had been healing from his time in the pit being broken open, leaking red into the water until it looked rusty. He needed the pain. He needed it to remind himself that he was alive.

Reid waited for the flow of blood to stop before he shut off the shower and stepped out, undoing the bag around his leg and leaving it on the doorknob. He'd clean everything up after he had eaten.

He clothed himself in a fluffy bathrobe, the cloth doing little to conserve what little heat his bony form mustered, and settled into the wheelchair, picking up his glasses and pushing them up the bridge of his nose. He propped up his broken leg, wincing when pain flicked up and down all the joints he was using that hadn't been moved in days, and then started to roll.

The movements were slow and unsteady, even worse than when he was trying to use the chair as a crutch. Still, he didn't want to hurt his leg any more. He rolled down the hall, his arms already starting to ache at the movement. This was an opportunity to build upper body strength, Morgan would have said.

Reid winced at the thought of Morgan. Too soon. He didn't want to think about the people he loved yet. He needed to gather himself.

His muscles cramped when he brought the chair to an abrupt halt in front of the kitchen. He clenched his teeth and bowed his head, releasing one wheel to move around his left and then right arm, trying to get the muscles a little more used to being  _used._  Then he spun one wheel to change direction and rolled into the kitchen.

There was a box on the table. More importantly, there was a little bundle of child sitting there, a white hat tugged over her face, white hair tangled at her shoulders, and her white arms wrapped around her white knees, which were tucked under her chin.

"Angeline!"

Momentarily, his hunger was forgotten. His hands shook as he wheeled a little closer, but she flinched and he abruptly stopped the movement, attempting to keep the chair still on the floor.

He lowered his voice, dread lining his stomach with lead. "Angeline. It's Spencer. What happened?"

One hand released her leg, moving to her ear, invisible under the hat. If her hands were dragonflies before, now they were dragonflies with damaged wings, their flight unsure and wobbling.

"May I have water?" Her voice was dry, and Reid could almost hear her tongue cracking on the words. His hand started to shake in his lap. "He said I couldn't eat or drink until you got here. Said he'd know if I drank before. May I drink?"

No. No, that couldn't—

It was okay to do to Reid. He was a grown man. He'd handle it. But she was just a  _kid._

"Yeah. Yeah, go drink."

Immediately, she jumped off her chair, making sure to tug the hat further over her face before running to the sink and turning on the faucet, cupping her hands under the running water and taking huge gulps, as if she'd never see water again. His shaking hand turned into a fist against his thigh.

"Eat, too. Just—just take everything that can be eaten raw out of the fridge and the pantry and put it on the table. Make sure to eat slowly, though, or you'll make yourself sick."

She didn't respond. She was too wrapped up in drinking to say anything, and honestly, Reid didn't blame her. While he waited, he picked up the box on the table and examined it. Contact lenses.

He looked downward and put the box aside again.

It was a while before she turned off the sink, catching her breath before wiping off her palms on her dress and scampering to the pantry. She did as told, grabbing everything with any kind of substance and a less than 10% chance of giving them food poisoning and putting it on the table. Reid resisted the urge to stuff his face and grabbed a pack of saltines first, but Angeline just grabbed a whole loaf of bread and bit into the end, tearing it off with her teeth and chewing.

"Slowly, Angeline," Reid reminded her gently, tearing open the pack of crackers. "And don't eat too much. Your body needs to ease back into eating."

She nodded and started to tear pieces of bread off with her hands instead of her teeth, but she didn't respond otherwise. She kept her head bowed, hiding her face behind the hat, and chewed.

Normally, he would try to ask her questions, but Reid had to satisfy his own hunger as well. They sat in silence, working on their food.

Reid only broke the silence when his body didn't feel so hollow anymore.

"Angeline, what did he do to you?"

At first, he didn't know if she would respond. She had moved on to an apple now, and she bit down on it, juice dribbling on her fingers as she chewed and swallowed.

"He got mad."

Her voice wasn't as dry as before, but it was dark. Reid pursed his lips and his brow knitted together. He ducked his head, trying to see under the hat, but she flinched away, pulling it further over her face.

"Angeline…" He struggled to keep from blaming himself, but he had  _known_  that trying to escape would be dangerous. He just didn't think that she… "Please let me see you."

She shook her head, her fingernails digging into the apple. "No. He said I'm hideous. He can't even look at me."

"You're not hideous," Reid said automatically. She pulled away from him, ready to withdraw, but he pressed on, keeping his voice soft. "You're—you're not. You're a beautiful little girl with pretty eyes, just like you—just like you said before. Darcy is just angry." His voice got even softer. "Just let me see you."

Her fingers clenched on the apple, one nail scratching into the skin and peeling it back. Finally, she grasped the edge of her hat with sticky fingers and raised it.

Reid had to hide his reaction. She was badly sunburned, her skin bright red and peeling, and a nasty fist-sized bruise blossomed on her cheek, further discoloring her complexion. Her lips were chapped and dry from so long without water, and her icy eyes looked dull and tired.

He took a breath before he responded. "It's just sunburn. It heals. Darcy's just angry. Just sit tight and let me—"

"This is  _your_  fault."

The sharp, accusatory tone made him feel like he was punched.

"You said you  _liked_  me."

Her lip wobbled. She struggled to control it, but it was hard to hide the glassiness in her eyes. Reid had the impulse to reach out to her and give her a hug, but his hands were frozen on the table as he desperately searched for words.

"I… it wasn't about you, Angeline, it was just—"

"Don't lie to me! I hate it when people lie to me!" She stood up from her chair, scurrying as far from him as she could get while still being within arm's reach of more food. "They all leave! All of them! What's wrong with me, Spencer?" She tried to tug the hat over her face again, but it was lopsided, and he could see the tears overflow and run down her burnt cheeks. "I tried, I really tried, because the last one told me that no one likes a brat with a rich daddy and I really just want one person, just one, because it's so lonely here and Darcy told me that he's not my daddy and I won't ever have any parents unless I'm good and someone likes me—what did I do  _wrong?_ "

His throat became tight. He pushed the wheels of his chair, trying to navigate around the table without getting caught on anything. "Nothing.  _Nothing_. You didn't do anything wrong. It's not your fault when anyone leaves."

That echoed in his head. It wasn't her fault she was abandoned by people she was told would take care of her. The fact that she thought it was—

Her shoulders shook with a stifled sob. He halted the progress of his chair, reaching out and brushing his fingers against her arm, and said the first thing that came to mind. "Come on. I can't—I can't stand up to give you a hug, so you have to get on my lap."

She didn't move, sniffling loudly, then wrapped her arms tightly around herself, turning to clamber up his chair. He didn't even care that he was only clothed in a bathrobe. He positioned her so that she sat on his good leg, then wrapped his arms tight around her. He pulled her up against his chest so she was cradled. She was light in his arms. She shouldn't have been.

"It wasn't you, Angeline. It wasn't you." He didn't know what to say, so he just kept telling her the truth over and over, but she wouldn't stop sobbing softly into his chest. He didn't know what to do. He wished desperately for JJ or Hotch or Morgan or his own mother. Any one of them would know what to do. Any one of them would be able to take this crying child and wipe her tears away and find a way to make her smile.

And none of them would have made her cry in the first place.

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."

This was his fault.

"I'm so sorry."

All his fault.

In desperation, he imitated something he saw JJ do once when Henry was crying. He tucked her head under his chin and made soft 'shhh' sounds, rocking her sobbing form gently as he stroked her hair. Every movement and sound felt forced to him, the product of a man out of his element and trying to do something right, but she didn't seem to mind. She was relaxing, slowly but surely, into his arms.

Soon, there was only the sound of his shushes.

After a minute of no sobbing, he slowed the rocking, sitting back into the wheelchair and pushing her away just enough to see her face, now blotchy with tears as well as sunburn. As visually obvious as the sunburn was, it was the bruise that churned his stomach the most. A little girl had been hit in the face because of him.

She sniffled, her lower lip wobbling but her eyes dry. She bowed her head, looking down at his hand settling on his leg, looking at the green and yellow beads still strung around his wrist.

"…I told you bracelets don't protect people."

Reid looked down at his hand numbly.

"Yeah. You were right."

He'd put it away. Maybe in the table beside his bed.

The Orula's Ide wouldn't help him here.

Angeline put the forgotten remains of her apple on the table, her hands sticky, and settled against Reid's chest. She looked up at him, her eyes surrounded by dark circles. "Please promise you won't do that again. Darcy won't listen to me if you do. I don't want to lose another."

His eyes softened, but it felt like something inside of him was extinguished.

"Alright," he said. "I promise."


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies for the late post, but with the beginning of the school year, both me and my beta reader have real life work to deal with. But don't worry--I don't intend to leave this story. 
> 
> Please comment. Criticism and compliments are both welcome.

Leo Tolstoy once wrote, "All happy families resemble one another; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way."

* * *

A week after he made his promise, Darcy still hadn't visited either of them, all the doors and windows stayed locked, and none of the tutors had arrived for lessons, so both of them found that they were either spending their time in the kitchen or in Angeline's room, where they were now.

Reid and Angeline were both going stir-crazy (the girl had taken to running up and down the hall in her socks to blow off energy), but Reid knew that it was up to him, as the adult, to make sure the girl was taken care of.

"Angeline, stop squirming."

She didn't stop. She just made an unhappy sound in the back of her throat, pouting while he rubbed the aloe gel into her cheeks with his thumbs. He had tried letting her do it for herself first, but she wouldn't put on enough, so now he was forced to put her in his lap and apply it himself.

"It  _stings!_ "

"I know, I know. But that's—it's going to feel good in a second."

Reid finished rubbing the gel into her sunburned cheeks, then moved on to her bare shoulders. He had been reluctant to touch her bare body (save for panties—those, he insisted on) at all, but after a certain point, one realized that she was a kid and she had sunburn. It was okay for him to touch her.

Angeline began to relax as the soothing effect of the aloe settled in and his hands were off the worst of her burn.

"You see? It's starting to feel better, right?" He smiled at her. She slumped against his chest as he finished rubbing in the gel. Reid chuckled softly, resting his chin on her head. "I told you."

She made a muffled 'mph' sound.

"Come on, Angeline." Reid ruffled her hair, wet from her bath. She looked up at him, icy eyes bright. The bruise on her cheek had faded into a yellow color with a purple border, and the sunburn was healing nicely as well. Reid figured it'd only be a couple more days before her complexion was completely white again. "W-we should practice reading. You put in your contacts this morning, right?"

"Yeah. I did."

Her hand went to scrub her eyes. Reid caught it in his, pushing it back down in her lap. "You shouldn't rub your eyes with contacts. Go—go put on your dress and meet me in the media room."

"You sure you don't need me to push you?" She giggled and poked him gently in the stomach before wiggling off his lap, standing up on the floor and taking the bottle of aloe from him.

"Sure, sure, make fun of the cripple." Reid waved at her dismissively, a twinkle in his eye. "I'll get you back for it when my leg heals, you know."

"I'll still outrun you." She grinned at him, putting the bottle down on her bedside table and then grabbing her dress from the covers. "I'm pretty fast."

"And I have long legs." Reid started to wheel out of the room, giving her a smile over his shoulder. "We'll see who wins. What book are you in the mood for?"

She pulled the dress over her head, then ruffled her own hair. Without Darcy around, she didn't wear her hair in a braid. It was long and fell way past her shoulders. "Matilda? Can we read Matilda?"

Reid smiled, rolling out of her room. "You know you're not up to that, yet."

"Well, I want to read it anyway!" she called after him, tugging her dress on over her head. "Read it to me and I'll work on reading for myself, okay?"

Reid rolled down the hall, still smiling a smile she couldn't see. "Twenty minutes. You have to give me twenty minutes of your own reading. Then I'll read you a chapter."

The huff he could hear from her room just made him chuckle. "Al _riiiiiiiight_."

* * *

"This is a stupid book."

"It's a beginner's book."

"Just let me read To Kill a Mockingbird."

"That's for more advanced readers."

"And this is for babies." Angeline lay 'Anansi the Spider' down on her lap, giving Reid the best flat look she could from the couch. "Maybe I should read the Weeping Woman instead."

"That's the same level as Anansi." Sort of. Reid was reluctant to hand over the Weeping Woman more because it was a very, very dark story to let a little girl read, more than he was because of its reading level.

"Then give me To Kill a Mockingbird!"

Staying inside for three weeks was really making Angeline cranky. To be honest, he was starting to go nuts from it as well.

Reid ran his hand up and down his cast, frowning at her. He was pretty tired. He was always tired when he had to wheel around everywhere. When his leg was fixed up, he'd try to work on his arm strength a little bit. This was ridiculous.

"Angeline, you can read more advanced books once you have a handle on the basics," he said patiently, forcing himself to not react to her grumpiness.

"This is more than basic! This is just stupid!" She threw up her hands, her white brow furrowed. "Who names their kid something like 'River Drinker'?"

"For the same reason the fish gave the fisherman golden children in that fairytale. It's a story." Reid took the book off her lap, opening it up to the first page and smoothing it out. He had no doubt that the girl would learn how to read and then become an avid reader soon, but the trick was to get her to start with the first step instead of jumping to the twentieth. "And besides: different cultures have different naming traditions. There are many cultures where a person is given a name meant to describe what traits their parents want them to have, such as bravery or intellect, or else a person has a primary name as a child and then are bestowed a more apt name when they reach adulthood in order to better describe who they are as a person."

She did not become glassy-eyed in the least at the explanation. She waved her hand, scowling. "Other cultures are weird."

"And they think our culture is weird, too." He held out the book to her again, leaning forward as much as he could with a broken leg. "I know you want to just jump right into it, but everyone needs to start at the beginning. The sooner you finish this, the sooner you can start reading To Kill a Mockingbird on your own."

She frowned at him, on the edge of a cabin fever-induced fit—honestly, if she had thrown a tantrum right then and there, he would have just let her.

But then, even from the media room in which they were sitting, they heard the familiar click of the kitchen door opening.

Angeline slammed the book shut and put it beside her. Reid, reacting with instinct alone, leaned forward, ignoring the pain in his leg, and plucked the little girl from the couch before placing her in his lap, right where he could easily protect her.

The little girl's expression smoothed to cool neutrality just before the dark form of Darcy walked into the room, his broad shoulders filling out the doorway and those sharp green eyes fixed on them, his lips a thin line.

There was a moment of tense silence. Reid wrapped one arm around the child's abdomen and the other around her chest, as if he could pull her within himself and curl up around her like a ball and protect her with his own body.

Darcy's mouth twisted into a scowl. "Angeline, your hair is disgusting." The child had no visible reaction. Those green eyes focused on Reid. "Go brush it and braid it  _properly._  Then leave her to study in the library and come back alone. We have to talk."

The tone was cold and clipped, but controlled with the same precision Reid had always witnessed from Darcy before the escape attempt. There was no immediate danger of a violent outburst. Reid wanted to keep it that way.

He swallowed, his Adam's apple bobbing, and nodded before detangling his arms from Angeline's body and wheeling away to her bedroom.

As soon as they were there, Angeline jumped off his lap, closing the door behind them. As Reid nervously readjusted in his wheelchair, she ran around the room, gathering a brush and a hair tie before coming back and sitting on his good leg.

"I haven't gotten any better at this," Reid warned, wrapping the hair tie around his wrist and starting to brush.

"It has to be perfect."

"I know."

It took forty-five painful minutes. Reid's hands ached, and Angeline continually undid the braid when he was halfway done. After a whole three weeks of being confined inside in a wheelchair, he was about ready to just toss the brush and refuse to do any more.

But finally— _finally_ —Angeline didn't undo the braid, and allowed him to tie it off in completion. Reid hoped that they hadn't angered Darcy by taking this long.

"Go to the library. I'll talk to you when I'm done, okay?" Reid patted her hip to encourage her to get off. She did so, her white braid swinging behind her, but she didn't leave immediately. Instead, she stopped by his side, placing her hands on his armrest.

"Be careful."

Her eyes were serious. Reid just nodded in response.

Then she was gone.

He sighed softly, hung his head, and wheeled away into the media room.

Darcy was sitting in his big cushioned armchair again, leaning back and looking at a book in his lap as if it were a thousand times more important than anything Reid had to say. "That took a long time."

"Y-yeah. I'm not—I'm still learning how to do it the way you like." Reid folded his hands in his lap. He didn't quite know what to say, but whatever he said, he wanted it to be what Darcy wanted to hear. "I… I'm sorry. For trying to leave."

Darcy seemed to ignore him for a minute. He finished off the page he was on, then slowly marked his place and closed the book before raising his head to look Reid in the eye.

Reid squirmed, very uncomfortable with the eye contact, and after a moment of attempting to meet the man's gaze, he averted his eyes. Submission. That was what Darcy wanted, right?

Darcy made a small derisive noise in the back of his throat. He stood up, putting the book down on his chair, and smacked the palm of his hand across Reid's face.

Reid yelped in surprise, curling up in his seat and putting his hand over the stinging pain in his cheek.

"You're pathetic."

Reid didn't respond. He just stayed curled up, hoping that the submission would satisfy the man.

"Absolutely pathetic."

There was a soft creak. Reid dared to peek out of his little protective ball. Darcy was sitting down, staring at the younger man expectantly. Reid slowly straightened out again, trying to not visibly nurse the bright red handprint that was no doubt forming on his cheek.

"I feed you, I clothe you, I shelter you—and this was how you repay me." Darcy leaned back in the chair, scowling at Reid. Inexplicably, Reid felt a pang of guilt, as though there were actually something to be grateful for, but he didn't have the time to examine that feeling before the bigger man continued. "I should have killed you, but Angeline was adamant that I not. I decided to give you one last chance at her request."

Reid swallowed, memories of how close to dying he had been flashing in his mind. He wondered what had happened to Angeline when he passed out. Did Darcy force her to stay in the sun? Did he hit her? Kick her?

"One more stunt like that, and I won't be so forgiving."

Reid focused his eyes a little below Darcy's, avoiding eye contact in a clear sign of submission, and traced the bigger man's defined, smooth features with his gaze. He had no doubt that the man was telling the truth. "I won't do it again."

Darcy examined his expression, mouth still fixed in a scowl. "You're damn right, you won't." The man stood up, smoothed his jacket, and walked past Reid. "Angeline's tutors will start coming again tomorrow. Make sure she's prepared for them. If her diction, manners, or cleanliness have slipped at all, I'll know who's at fault."

Darcy stopped at the door. He looked back at Reid, his gaze hard.

"And next time, look me in the eyes like a real man."

And he was gone.

* * *

He didn't promise that he'd never leave. He just promised he wouldn't try to escape. He still had hope that his team would find him.

Over time, that hope dwindled.

And then it died.

* * *

After Darcy came back, life got back to… well, something like normal. Darcy was in control again, and even became somewhat pleasant to talk to in the mornings before it was time for Angeline to wake up. During sleepy Saturday mornings over mugs of coffee, Reid learned that Darcy worked in investment banking, which would explain all the money, but Reid suspected that his banking went down shadier routes. During Sunday mornings, Darcy had Reid rub tinted sunscreen on Angeline, give her sunglasses and a hat, and send her to Sunday Mass with him. The tutors came every 'school' day and Reid was shackled to his bed every night.

And every night after Angeline finished whatever she did with Darcy in the evening, she would crawl into Reid's bed, snuggle up to his chest, and ask for a story.

"We already finished To Kill a Mockingbird and all the fairytales, Angeline," Reid said one night, stifling a yawn. "I'm starting to run out of stories to tell." Or, well, appropriate stories, at least.

"You can't run out of stories!"

Despite it being way past her bedtime, she was practically buzzing with energy next to him. On one hand, it was adorable. On the other hand, Reid really wanted to sleep.

"Oh really? Can you think of a story for me to tell?" He curled his fingers in her soft hair, taking comfort in her presence and wondering how the hell JJ or Hotch ever managed to get any sleep with a small child running around.

"You gotta stay awake to tell a story!" She poked his stomach, making him wince before making a muffled noise. "Tell me about what you did before this!"

"What I did before this?" Reid scrubbed his eye with the heel of his hand, stifling another yawn. "I was a profiler."

"What's a profiler?"

Reid rested his arm across her body, unable to see her in the darkness. "It means that I worked for the government to help find people who did a lot of bad things."

"So… you were like Atticus Finch?"

Reid chuckled softly, settling down on the bed and running his fingers through her hair. Sometimes, that would make her a little sleepier. "Atticus Finch was a lawyer. In the criminal justice system…" he thought about it for a moment, trying to think of something simple, "…there are three categories, okay? There are people who find and take in people who are suspected of doing something bad, there are people who argue over whether or not there's enough evidence to prove that the person did something bad, and there are people who decide on how to punish that person and how to enforce that punishment. Lawyers are in the second category and profilers are in the first."

She nodded against his shoulder. She didn't even need clarification. "Then tell me a story about being a profiler."

His mind swirled with memories. Some were good, and some… not so much.

"I can't tell you about being a profiler without telling you about my team."

He could feel her eyes fixing on him even through the darkness.

"Then tell me about your team."

He stroked her hair a little more firmly. He could hear some sleepiness coming into her voice.

"I'll tell you about them, then I'll tell  _one_  story. After that, bed. Alright?"

"Alright."

He took a deep breath. He remembered. "There were seven of us, but there've been four others who were all members of our team at some point. I'll tell you about the ones there now, okay?"

She stifled a yawn. He took that as a sign of his head strokes working. "Okay."

"Okay." He smiled into the darkness, even though there was an ache in his chest. "Okay. Let's—let's start with Hotch. He's our leader. Very—he always strikes other people as stern or scary, but we all know that that's just how he is. He always feels like there's a lot at stake, but he… he takes care of the people he loves. And he's good at it, too. It always seemed like he knew what to do. When the rest of us were upset about anything, he'd know. He'd always know…"

It took a long time before he realized that most of the conversation had been in past tense.

* * *

Slowly but surely, Reid came to enjoy the quiet morning ritual before he woke Angeline.

Without fail, he woke up when Darcy unlocked his shackles. He would rub his ankles, returning feeling to them, and then follow the other man to the kitchen, where there was always water boiling in the kettle and the coffeepot bubbling.

Darcy never had a real breakfast. Honestly, neither did Reid. Every morning, Reid would shamble in after Darcy's much more clipped pace. Reid's routine was simple—drag himself to the coffeepot Darcy kindly started half an hour before waking him up, pour himself coffee, ruin it with a ton of sugar, and then quietly nurse it at the kitchen table, curled up like a sleepy cat. Darcy's routine was even simpler—pour out tea for himself, then sip for a while before washing the mug and leaving.

Sometimes, they drank in silence. Sometimes, they spoke. Reid found that he could usually predict what kind of day Darcy was expecting to have by what tea he drank. Black tea for a busy day, chai when he had an important meeting, raspberry if he was going to interact with clients, white during a normal work day, mint during the weekends or days when he didn't have work, and then there was peach. When Darcy took out a little peach teabag, Reid knew to tread lightly—that usually meant that the man was in a bad mood and was trying to calm himself down.

Despite that, Reid was rarely afraid. Darcy had an explosive temper, but there were always warning signs if he was in a foul mood, and the man always removed himself to brood in safe solitude. Peach tea only made rare appearances, especially during their sleepy conversations in the early mornings.

In fact, it was one such morning about three months after Reid's admittedly ill-advised escape attempt (now the leaves were beginning to change color outside, though he only saw them rarely) when Darcy suddenly said, "You're too skinny."

"Hmm?" Reid wasn't completely awake yet. He looked up from his coffee, blinking blearily at the sharply dressed man across from him before pushing back some hair that was falling in his eyes.

"You're too skinny. It's good to be trim, but not a beanpole." Darcy sipped his raspberry tea. Everything about him was neat. His unwrinkled suit, his finely lined face, his short black hair—how did the man manage it? "Do you eat anything while I'm at work?"

Reid blinked again, running his finger against the warm edge of his mug. "S-sure I do." He couldn't say he was surprised to be confronted on his health habits. Everyone talked to him about it at some point. "I eat with Angeline. Children who eat with guardians are statistically less likely to experiment with drugs and sex at a young age."

"You're already thinking about that?" Darcy raised an eyebrow, but then he shrugged. "I don't think you'll need to worry about her experimenting. She's being raised to be a  _lady._  But that's beside the point—"

Reid only had time to frown a little before Darcy pointed at him. "The point is that you're unhealthily skinny. What do you usually like to eat?"

Reid furrowed his brow, taking a sip of coffee. "Well, uh… I usually eat while I'm traveling, so it's mostly stuff you'd find in a vending machine."

"So utter garbage, you mean." Darcy shook his head, taking a sip of tea. "No, you're not going to eat like that anymore. Tonight, I'm coming in here with healthy meal recipes."

…Well. Reid wasn't entirely sure what to do with that. Other than their conversations in the morning, he and Darcy didn't interact too often. "I'm not very good at… well, cooking in general. I really only know how to cook Italian." And that was because he had been taught.

"Then I'll teach you." Darcy drained the last of his tea and got up from the table. "And then you should teach Angeline once she's maybe seven and a half. She'll likely have chefs serving her for her whole life, but she should know how to cook for others."

Reid straightened up in his seat, watching the other man wash his mug. "You would do that? I thought you were too busy to stay here for long."

"I'm busy, but I can spare a couple hours a week. Now then, remember to wake Angeline at eight." He walked to the door connecting the kitchen to his side of the mansion, unlocking it. "And by the way, I think you've proven yourself. You won't have to be chained to your bed anymore, and you may have your name back."

And before Reid could even respond, he was gone.

* * *

When Angeline was six and three quarters, Reid asked why Darcy always took her away for a small amount of time before bed. He tried not to let onto his concern, but the worry had been gnawing at him, and eventually he had to ask.

They were outside, the air beginning to warm back up enough for them to swim again. While she picked flowers from the ground, only the moon illuminating her way, she glanced up at Reid carefully. "He said not to tell anyone."

Reid swallowed, but that was his only tell as he stood above her, hands stuck in his pockets. "I won't say anything. It can just be our little secret."

Angeline mulled over it, then turned back to the flowers, making a small bouquet of daisies and daffodils.

"Please, Angeline?"

She touched a daisy petal, rubbing it in between her fingertips. "He likes me to sing to him before he goes to sleep."

Reid furrowed his brows. That wasn't what he expected. "What? Why?"

"I don't know." She looked up briefly and pressed a finger to her lips. "Our secret."

It felt like a weight was taken off of his chest. He didn't know  _why_  Darcy would want that, but the important thing was that Angeline wasn't being touched. She was safe.

"Do you know what flower this is?" she asked as she plucked a snowdrop from the ground, showing it to him.

"Oh, that's a snowdrop." Reid knelt down on the ground next to her, gesturing for her to hand him the flower, and started to ramble about botany.

* * *

"Here are the ear drops you asked for." Darcy put the bottle down on the kitchen table, glancing over Reid's shoulder at the door. "Is there anything else you think she will need?"

"Just Tylenol." Reid picked up the bottle, checking the label to make sure it was the right brand of ear drops. "Ear infections are very common for children. She probably got it from all of her swimming."

Reid looked up at the man's somewhat anxious face and smiled, amused by how reticent the man seemed about Angeline's illness. It really wasn't any surprise that the man spent minimal time with the girl. He hadn't the slightest clue how to deal with kids.

"And you are… certain it's not serious?"

Reid nodded patiently, a small smile still on his face. Darcy was a smart man, and generally one who was very good at maintaining control, so it was kind of fun to see him so uncertain about something.

"Yeah. Yeah, the doctor—that doctor you got, he said that it was just an infection. It's nothing serious; she'll just be kinda grumpy for a few days." He gestured to the bottle. "And this'll clean it up. Don't worry about it."

Darcy nodded slowly, his eyes narrowed in the way they always were when he wasn't sure what to do.

"I'll just give these to her." Reid turned away, walking towards the door, then paused, glancing over his shoulder. "Also, we're out of coffee. Do you mind picking some while you're out?"

Darcy nodded, furrowing his brow as he walked towards the opposite door. "Light roast, canned?"

"Yes, please."

Despite his cluelessness with children, Reid had to hand it to Darcy—he knew what he liked.

"You have terrible taste in coffee," Darcy said as he shook his head and unlocked the door.

"I never pretended otherwise."

Reid chuckled to himself as he walked to Angeline's room. The six-year-old was sitting on her bed, frowning and pulling at her ear.

"Don't play with your ear, Angel." Reid sat down beside her, patting his lap. "Lie with your head here. I'll put the drops in for you, and then you should stay lying down for a little bit."

Angeline squirmed as she did as told. Reid reached over her to grab tissues from her bedside table. "How long will this last, Spencer?"

"Typically, between one day and ten."

"Ten days?!"

"Shhhh." Reid shushed her as he moved her braid out of the way. "Just let me get your ear, okay?"

She made an unhappy sound in the back of her throat, but she settled down. He dripped the prescribed number of drops into her ear, then rested his hand on her head, gently stroking her temple. "Now stay still for a bit."

"What if I don't want to stay still?" she asked, her hands twitching to scratch at her ear, a cranky edge to her voice.

"Then this will take longer than ten days. Just keep still and let the medicine work." Reid leaned down and gently brushed his lips against her temple, her forehead warm against his mouth. "You'll be glad you did it later."

As he straightened out his back again, he realized that that was the first time he had  _ever_  kissed Angeline.

If she noticed, she gave no immediate indicator. She was unhappy and cranky the whole time and continued to be so all day, deliberately challenging Reid every time he told her to do something and refusing to pay attention to lessons. He really didn't blame her—he remembered having an ear infection when he was young, and they had a way of making tempers foul. He had a feeling that she was getting frustrated by his lack of anger.

But at bedtime, he was taking advantage of Darcy's slowly built trust. Reid was finally allowed to be free from his nighttime shackles, so instead of Angeline coming to him, he came to her to say goodnight and tell a story.

(He liked the fact he could toss and turn in his sleep and Angeline wouldn't regularly keep him up anymore, but he couldn't help but miss falling asleep with a warm child snuggled against his chest.)

He finished his story—a repeat of one of her favorites, a version of Garcia's James Colby Baylor story that Reid had sanitized (Angeline loved hearing about JJ 'getting the bad guy')—and he smiled at the girl as he slid off of his seat beside her. "Good night."

"Spencer?"

Reid paused and glanced back. She reached out with one little arm, the limb too short to actually reach him. He obligingly moved close again, allowing her to grasp his shirt. "Yeah? What is it?"

"Can you kiss me goodnight?"

His eyebrows automatically went up and, he had to admit, his cheeks became a little pink. "W-why?"

The second after he said it, he could have smacked himself for how ridiculously awkward it sounded. Even after nine months, he still sometimes had  _no idea_  how to properly handle a child.

She tugged gently on his shirt, scooting closer to the edge of the bed to get a better grip.

"Because in those books we read where the kids have good parents, they get goodnight kisses. I've never had one." Her eyes became a little wider, a tried and true trick that Reid  _recognized_  and yet still fell for  _every time_. "Please?"

…Goddamn it, how was he supposed to say no to that?

His cheeks became a little rosier as he sat back down on the bed. "Y-you know, it's not that abnormal for people to not kiss children…" Especially when said children were technically not theirs.

"But it means that parents love their kids, so…"

That gave Reid pause. The pause lasted long enough for Angeline to lean forward and give him a peck on the mouth, contact so brief and light that he could hardly tell what had made him nervous in the first place. "Good night!"

Then, with the biggest grin he'd ever seen, she settled back into bed and pulled the covers over her head.

"…Good night, Angel."

He decided to make one last concession with his general discomfort with touch—every night, Angeline could get a goodnight kiss. Sometimes, he'd even give her a kiss on the face because he just had the urge to.

When he realized that he was perfectly fine with that, he knew in his heart that he loved her.

* * *

There was once a time when Reid dreaded braiding Angeline's hair in the morning.

As he ran his fingers through the girl's hair, combing it with his hand before giving it a proper brushing, it was hard to remember why he would ever feel that way.

"So, how does it feel being seven?" he asked, smiling as he ran a brush through her hair. Beside him lay a delicate row of fully bloomed wisteria they had picked last night while romping around the backyard. The purple flowers had been growing on the side of an old unused gardening shed, and Angeline had begged Reid to put her on his shoulders to let her pick some, despite the fact she was quickly growing to be tall enough to get it herself.

"A lot like being six. Which was a lot like being five." He could tell she wanted to turn around to see him, but she had gotten better about sitting still in the year he'd been here. "Thirty feels different than seven, six, and five, right?"

Reid chuckled softly, parting her hair into three perfectly proportioned sections. "It feels  _very_  different. But it's not like you just suddenly feel older on your birthday; it's more subtle than that."

With a twist of his wrist, he gathered any stray strands of hair in their given sections, making them neat and free of flyaways. "I'm betting you act very different than you did when you turned five."

"I don't think so."

"Like I said, it's subtle." He picked up the wisteria, starting to braid it in her hair, putting a splash of lavender in the overwhelming white. "You know, you haven't asked what your present is."

She made a little squeaking sound. Reid could feel the excited tremors as he twisted her hair and the flowers together. "You're giving me a present?!"

"Of course. It's your birthday." He leaned forward, kissing the part in her hair. "It took me a while to talk Darcy into it. You have to be on your  _best_  behavior."

"What are we doing? What are we doing?" The girl was trying very hard to control herself, but she was always worse at that when she was alone with Reid than if she was with Darcy. Her caretaker couldn't help but smile warmly as he kept braiding her hair.

"We're going to a museum. In the  _daytime._ "

She gasped. Reid's smile turned into a grin.

"Now, I talked him into it because it's educational and today's going to be rainy, so there won't be much sun. I know that there's not much they can tell you there that you don't already know, but it's different being able to see things, believe me." He tied off her braid, patting her shoulder to tell her that he's done. "There are going to be some rules, but—"

As he withdrew his hands, Angeline jumped in place, spinning and hugging him around his neck tightly. "Thank you! Thank you, Spencer!"

That hug that threatened to choke him made all the days trying to convince Darcy worthwhile.

"Come on, Angel," he gasped out, patting her back while his Adam's apple tried to move under her (remarkably sharp) collarbone. "Come on, Angel, I need to breathe."

"No you don't."

She pulled away anyway, those pale blue eyes bright. "I'll be on my best behavior."

"I know you will be." He patted her cheek, unable to stop smiling when he saw how happy she was. "But I'm still outlining the rules for you. You have to wear sunscreen, a hat, and sunglasses. Stay by my side at all times, and if I tell you to do something, you  _need_  to listen to me. Darcy wants you to represent him and your etiquette teacher well, so be polite, okay?" He impulsively leaned forward and kissed her on the nose, eliciting a giggle.

"Okay, Spencer! I can do all that!" She bounced in place, reaching out and taking one of his hands in hers. "When do we go?"

"When you're ready. Darcy hired a driver for this one day. You start putting on sunscreen and I'll get the things you need to wear, okay?"

She was off like a bullet, rifling around her room in search of sunscreen. Reid smiled, sliding off her bed, and started walking to grab the hat and sunglasses he had convinced Darcy to get.

It didn't occur to him that he was being given an opportunity to escape.

* * *

It still didn't occur to him when they actually were in the museum. Even if it had, he would have been immediately terrified of even trying—over the months, he had unknowingly cultivated the notion that Darcy was omnipotent—but more than anything, he would just be scared of seeing Angeline cry like she did ever again.

"Angeline, don't touch the exhibits." Reid knelt to the tiled ground, taking her hands in his and pulling them away from the rope separating them from the life-sized diorama of a regiment of the Southern army and a regiment of the Northern army aiming their guns at each other.

"They look weird. It looks like they're fake."

"That's because they are." Reid straightened up, but he kept one of Angeline's hands in his, instincts from his last life telling him to hold tight in case one of the strangers bustling around them took an interest. "They usually make these models out of a combination of papier-mâché and chicken wire."

"Why don't they just pay someone to stand there?"

"Because that would be expensive." Reid smiled down at her, giving her hand a gentle squeeze. "And who would want to just stand there all day anyway?"

Angeline shrugged, looking at the plaque fixed in front of the display. It was just listing dates, really, but she was interested in reading it anyway because when else would she get this opportunity?

Reid kept her hand in his, but he took a moment to steal a glance around the museum. He had to admit, he felt extremely uncomfortable in a crowd after so long being isolated. He didn't like having his back to all these people, and the steady hum of lots of people talking at once put him on edge. He didn't know anyone here, so he couldn't be sure that none of them would hurt Angeline.

A couple came closer to them, and Reid used the term 'couple' loosely. He ducked his head, moving a little to pull Angeline further away from them while a big man continued to talk very loudly to a woman who seemed very much like she didn't want to be there.

"…I mean, everyone  _knew_  that the North would kick the South's rear, so you know, it was all about shaking their fists. The War was really about the South stamping their feet and the North spanking them, you know—"

"Actually, the South looked like they were going to win for a while there." It was out of Reid's mouth before he even realized it. As the couple turned their heads to look at him, he kept talking, the habit ingrained, and he bounced lightly on the balls of his feet as his free hand came up near his chin and a couple fingers folded towards his palm. "The North assumed they would win because of superior resources, yeah, but the South used very intelligent strategizing and mostly played towards defending themselves. It wasn't until the Battle of Gettysburg that the war turned in the North's favor, and that was partially because Robert E. Lee never tried to invade the Northern territory again, as up to then, attempts to invade the North consistently ended badly for the South. And then Sherman obliterated the South with his application of 'total war', which crippled the South physically and psychologically. So really, winning wasn't guaranteed at all—even—"

"You're a rude one, aren't you?" The man glared at Reid, cutting him off in a way that made Angeline immediately look up at him and frown. While the woman with the man tried to hide her smile, the man continued, "What makes you think you know any more about it than I do?"

"The fact that he's the smartest man you'll ever meet?"

All eyes turned to Angeline, whose white brow was furrowed and whose eyes were a little narrow, and she continued before Reid could cut her off and drag her away, "And he's right. Actually, it was a lot bigger than just a tantrum like you implied. The South was angry about Lincoln being elected because they felt like they weren't represented—which was actually kind of  _true_ , since Lincoln wasn't even on the  _ballot_  in some Southern states. The South was divided between a lot of Democratic candidates while the North was pretty unified behind Lincoln, so the more densely populated North got its choice. The big issue of the time was whether slavery would spread or not, but the South was angry about more than that." She was gesturing a lot with the hand she had free from Reid, hovering it around chin-level and folding a couple fingers towards her palm, a little like her hand was some kind of pincer. It was  _exactly_  the way Reid always held his hands when he was rambling. "And, you know, even if you're still going to call it a tantrum, tantrums don't usually have casualties of up to 170,000 people."

There was silence. Angeline bounced lightly on the balls of her feet, her chin stuck out defiantly.

And then the woman who previously didn't want to be there burst out laughing. She drew confused glances from her date and Reid, but she ignored them, clapping her hands together once and grinning. "Oh, that is fantastic. Aiden, when a little girl corrects you on your history, it's time to brush up." She looks at Reid, her face still lit up despite the darkening of her date's. "Your daughter's brilliant. You must be very proud."

Reid felt color come to his cheeks. The woman smiled and took the man by his wrist. "Come on, Aiden. Before you embarrass yourself more."

And then with one last glare, the man allowed himself to be dragged away.

It took Reid a moment to respond again. He looked down at Angeline, his lips turned into a small frown. "You know, I should have told you to apologize to him. You were rude, Angeline."

She met his eyes, her chin still stuck out. "He was rude to you first."

Reid shook his head, but he really couldn't bring himself to scold her too harshly. "Two wrongs don't make a right. Why don't we look at another exhibit?"

He didn't acknowledge that the woman had mistaken him for Angeline's father. Neither did Angeline, at first.

And then that night, after they had finally left the museum and Angeline had solemnly declared that day the best birthday of her life, Reid had trouble tucking her in. She was bouncing off the walls, rambling about how fascinating the exhibits were and wondering if Darcy would let them go again and how other people seemed so strange and some people's hair was really too colorful and didn't he think that simple white or brown or black was better—

But Reid finally quieted her down, got her into bed, and leaned close to say good night.

"Sleep well, Angel."

She leaned forward, giving him a light peck. "Goodnight, Daddy."

And then she flopped down in bed and closed her eyes, saving him from having to respond. Good thing, too, since he had no idea  _how_  to respond. He hadn't really thought at length about what Angeline was to him.

He thought about it over the course of the night. He still hadn't figured it out by the morning.

But still, that morning, Angeline was difficult to wake as usual. She just put a pillow over her head and mumbled, "Five more minutes, Daddy."

He decided to let her keep calling him that.

* * *

When she was seven and a half, Angeline's dance teacher, Ms. Turner, quit. She said that she pursuing a job with a theater company. While Darcy immediately got a new instructor (Mrs. Carpenter), Angeline wasn't used to change, and she  _definitely_  wasn't fond of people going away.

So Reid was stuck with a very,  _very_  difficult child for a week.

"Angeline, take off your socks while you're running around near the stairs. You're going to fall and hurt yourself," Reid chided, trying to keep from running out of patience. It was difficult after three days of straight 'No' and 'I don't want to' and 'why?'

Angeline gave a cranky harrumph, deliberately sliding across the floor of the hall, paying little attention to the staircase. Reid took a deep breath, reminded himself to pick his battles, and sighed softly, sitting slowly on the top step of the stairs with the book Angeline was reading with him. He had hoped a change of scenery (or… well, the closest they could  _get_  without going outside) would calm her down a little, but apparently not.

"Do you want to talk about Ms. Turner?"

"No."

Reid pursed his lips, resisting the urge to rub his temples. "Then what do you want to talk about? You don't seem to want to read."

"I don't want to talk about anything."

At this point, Reid was pretty sure she was trying to provoke him.

"Do you want to tell me why you're angry, Angeline?"

"I'm not angry."

"Yes, you are."

"No, I'm not."

"Angeline." Reid turned in place to face her, frowning. "You're getting too old for this. You're upset. Sit down and talk about it or try to handle it on your own—either way, you can't take it out on other people."

Angeline gave the biggest scowl she could, sliding towards Reid in her socks. "I'm not taking any—oh!"

Her foot slid out from under her. It felt like the entire world slowed down. She tumbled down the stairs, her bones making sickening crunches with every hit, and then she was prone on the ground, still. Completely and utterly still.

Reid didn't remember getting up. All he knew was that a moment later, he was kneeling next to her, his heart hammering in his chest and his hands grasping her little arms.

"Angeline? Angeline, are you okay?"

He was certain she was dead, his throat tight, like someone was strangling him, and he quickly touched his finger to her wrist, praying to a god he didn't believe in.

He let out a breath he had no idea he was holding. There was a heartbeat. His hands were shaking with adrenaline as he quickly checked her over for cuts, bruises, and broken bones, fingers fluttering over her body and touching, prodding, moving.

As he saw she had no injuries, his anxiety changed into relief, and then that relief turned into fury that he didn't remember feeling for a long time.

He grabbed her shoulders, grip rougher than any other time he had ever touched her, and he took a deep breath to give her a vicious scolding.

Then she whimpered.

All the anger rushed out of him.

"Daddy, it hurts…"

Her entire body started to shake. He quickly double-checked to make sure he hadn't missed any damage, his grip on her shoulders loosening considerably. "What hurts?"

"Everything."

She leaned into his chest, burying her face into his shirt. He could feel tears wetting the cloth above his heart.

He wrapped his arms around her, careful to listen for any sounds of pain, and stood up, keeping her balanced on his hip. Her cries were quiet, confined mostly to whimpers and soft sobs that made her body convulse against his. "Come on. We're going to go to your room. You get classes off today."

She nodded against his chest and allowed him to carry her up the stairs into her white room before sitting her down on the bed. Then Reid sat down behind her, grabbed a brush, and undid her braid.

As he ran the brush through her hair, his touch as gentle as it always was, her sniffles began to wane, and eventually, they stopped.

* * *

When she was eight, he started teaching her biology and some biochemistry.

Reid was making lunch—honestly, he should have been teaching Angeline how to cook while he did it, but she was busy right now—as she sketched out each stage of mitosis on a paper without using any reference.

The frying pan sizzled when Reid put the soon-to-be grilled cheese sandwich on. Two years ago, he would have burned himself while doing this. Now, he hardly had to watch himself.

"That smells good," Angeline mumbled softly, her white brow furrowed as she kept drawing.

"Just keep working. Then you can eat it." Reid put aside his spatula, taking out celery sticks and starting to chop them up.

He had cut three and put the pieces on her plate before she said, "Hey, Dad?"

Reid turned around to look at the girl. Her pencil was resting against an unfinished sketch, her brow furrowed in a familiarly curious expression. "What is it, Angeline?"

She looked up at him, her brow still furrowed. "How do humans reproduce?"

…

…

…

… _Fuck._

"Uh…"

Angeline burst into giggles, dropping her pencil and covering her mouth. "Oh, you should see your face right now!"

Reid opened his mouth, then closed it, his face burning red. Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck fuck  _fuuuuuuuuuck._

"I'll, uh…" What was he supposed to say? Or do? Or… oh  _fuck_  it never occurred to him that he might need to actually have this conversation at some point. "I'll… tell you when you're older…?"

"No." She giggled again, shaking her head while she kept her mouth covered. "No, not after you react like that. You're gonna tell me how it happens."

"Going to," Reid automatically corrected, though his mind wasn't on her enunciation.

Oh  _damn_  it, how the hell was he supposed to do this?

Reid chewed on his lip, slowly shuffling towards the half-done grilled cheese. "Uh… why don't you just… finish those sketches, and we'll talk over lunch, okay?" After all, he had to tell her  _some_  time, right?

She giggled again, and then nodded. "Holding you to it." She looked back down at her paper, but she still burst into occasional giggles.

Well, at least Reid had a  _little_  time to think about how he would approach this.

But not enough time. When she finally put her paper and pencil aside and he slid her plate in front of her, he still had  _no clue_  how to talk about it. Maybe she would forget that he—

"So how do humans reproduce?"

Reid hated his life.

He slowly sat down across from her, his face bright red. Alright. Alright, alright, alright, alright…

"W-well… it's like what we've been learning. There are sex cells that hold genetic information, and… well, humans don't asexually reproduce."

Angeline arched an eyebrow. It dawned on Reid that he really was her only source of proper information—had he ever even told her that it took two to have a child?

Fuck.

"Y-yeah. To reproduce, humans need someone of the opposite sex. Women have ova, whereas men have spermatozoa." Maybe talking about it like a science lesson would make it a little eas—

"How do the sex cells come together and make a zygote, then?" Angeline cut in, nibbling on a piece of celery.

Reid really, really hated his life.

"Th-that's…" Okay, so this couldn't just be a science lesson. Reid put his elbows on the table and slowly ran his hands through his hair. He had to stop thinking like an awkward man who barely knew how he himself felt about sex and start thinking like a guardian. How did he want Angeline to think about these things?

"Okay. Okay, I'm making it seem like a bigger deal than it is." He took a deep breath, then straightened his spine, unable to stop chewing his lip but doing his best to get rid of the rest of his awkward body language. "The thing is that it's an entirely natural process that most complex organisms go through, but with humans, it's… well, it's a very personal thing, so some people get embarrassed, myself included."

Angeline kept nibbling on her celery, watching him. Despite her maturity and her intellect, Reid knew that he was basically alone in shaping how she turned out. He didn't want her to be as uncomfortable with sex and intimacy as he was.

"How much do you know about the differences between male and female bodies? I was going to work up to that from the cellular level, but we can jump ahead."

Angeline frowned, then held up a hand, tilting it side to side in the air. "I don't really know much. I know that women have breasts and look curvier than men, but not much more than that."

Reid cleared his throat, still struggling to keep from getting immobilized by embarrassment. "Do you know about the difference between human male and female genitalia?"

She cocked her head, giving him a quizzical look. "What?"

Reid had failed as an educator.

"Okay. Okay, we'll start at the basics, then."

He gestured for her to wait a moment, then he gets up from his chair and leaves the room. It didn't take him long before he came back with a notepad and a pencil and sat beside her, making a rough sketch of male genitals, diagramming it and labeling every part, from the scrotum to the vas deferens. His face burned while he did it, but it made it easier when he thought about the fact that this was just a teaching tool.

Angeline put her sandwich down slowly, her brow more furrowed than ever as she watched his hand work. "That looks like an alien."

"Yes, it does, but it's not an alien."

Reid tapped the drawing with his eraser when he was finished. "It's a penis. Every person who's born as a man has one between their legs."

Angeline glanced between him and the paper quizzically. "Even you?"

He had  _really_  been hoping she would keep this theoretical and  _not_  ask about him. "Yes, even me." He started sketching again before she could ask more questions, only this time, it was a diagram of a woman's reproductive organs. "Now, since you have this, you're a little more familiar with female organs, but there are a lot of internal parts to it that you probably don't know about yet. Women have evolved to be able to incubate and later care for children, and their biology reflects that. I'll get into more detail at another point, because this is just a basic overview." Also because he didn't want to try to explain periods without at  _least_  some kind of… oh, he doesn't know, a book aiming to educate prepubescent girls. Because  _seriously._

Angeline's brow furrowed further. "But how does the spermatozoa fertilize the ova? Where are the sex cells coming from anyway?"

He could feel his blush coming on again. "W-well…" Deep breath, Reid. Deep breath. "Spermatozoa are produced here," he tapped the drawing of testicles with his eraser, "and ova are stored here." He tapped the drawing of ovaries. "Once a month, a mature woman ovulates, and a singular ovum leaves the ovaries and is made available for fertilization. And, well…"

Shit shit shit fight the blush, Reid, fight it.

"Well, male and female genitalia fit together. Sort of like puzzle pieces? With sufficient stimulation, a man will, uh, ejaculate the appropriate sex cells within the woman, and that gives them a chance to create a zygote. There's, uh, there's a little more to it than that, but I can explain the biological processes in more detail later." Later, as in when he had a textbook to help do the explaining for him.

He took a deep breath, leaving the notepad on the table for Angeline's further inspection and walking to the stove to wash the utensils he used to cook. "So, uh, right. That's how humans reproduce."

"Does it feel good?"

…Well, that blush is definitely back now.

"E-excuse me?" Reid glanced back at her, trying and failing to keep his embarrassment contained. "I—why do you want to know?"

"Because I'm guessing I'm going to do it at some point, so I want to know."

… _WOW_  he had never felt so uncomfortable with the thought of someone having sex in his  _life._  No, Angeline. You are not allowed to have sex, you are not allowed to go out with boys, and you are not allowed to grow up so start asking questions about mitosis or something and finish your lunch.

Or, well, that was what he  _wanted_  to say.

"It…"

He gently rubbed his temple, feeling a headache coming on. After this, he was going to just get her started on a pop quiz and then curl up in his room with the lights off until the migraine passed.

"Okay, I'm going to do my best to be honest because I don't want you to think this topic is off limits."

He moved away from the sink, wringing his hands dry and sitting next to Angeline again. "The truth is that yes. It does feel good. People do it with measures put in place to avoid pregnancy, because it's not always about children. A lot of the time, it's about intimacy."

He gestured for Angeline to give him her hands. She rested them against his palms, the hands half the size of his own. He curled his fingers around them and gave her a squeeze. "That's the thing. It's really intimate, and people value it differently. There are some people who use sex as a commodity and sell it, and there are some people who choose to wait until they're married so their spouse is the only one they'll ever sleep with. I-I personally think it's really important and requires a lot of trust and love, or else it doesn't really mean much."

He worked his jaw, staring at her tiny hands in his. His mind flitted over his own past sexual partners—the person he had slowly worked up to during graduate school, the very few people in his professional life, the people who came onto him when he was high and whose names and faces he couldn't even remember after coming down—and he lightly ran his thumbs against the back of her hands. "So… you're not ready, Angeline. You won't be for a while. But when you feel you're ready, try to wait just a little longer to make sure, because it is really affecting, and I want you to talk to me about it first, no matter how embarrassed I get. It's important that you feel like you can come to me if you need anything."

Reid finally looked up to make eye contact. Angeline's mouth was in a straight, serious line. He reached out, his expression softening substantially, and pushed a lock of hair that had escaped her braid behind her ear.

"Because you're a beautiful, smart, wonderful little girl, and you'll be a beautiful, smart, wonderful woman. I think… I think you should wait until you meet someone who deserves that."

Her serious expression flickered, her eyes getting a little glassy.

"And if  _anyone_  at all  _ever_  touches you without your explicit, willing permission, I want you to tell me." He stopped, then squeezed her hand gently. "And… And tell me if anyone even wants to touch you before you're at least sixteen. Because that's not alright, and it will never  _be_  alright." Even after all the years, somewhere, something in the back of his mind was wary. Wary of Darcy, and why he might have a girl that wasn't his own. "Okay?"

"Okay. I get it." Angeline nodded solemnly. "I'll talk to you."

"Good." Reid leaned forward, giving her a gentle peck. "Finish lunch, clean up after yourself, and start diagramming meiosis. I need to go lie down."

"Alright, Dad. I won't bother you."

And luckily for his migraine, she didn't.  


* * *

Over years, he forgot things. He forgot that he never agreed to be there. He forgot what freedom and friendship felt like. His old life became a dream.

Even his team faded in his mind, becoming only part of the stories he told.

All that was real were Darcy and Angeline.

All he really cared about was his daughter.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry about the slow update, but I had a lot of schoolwork to deal with. Hopefully, this makes up for it!
> 
> My beta was nutella4ever. I'm open to praise or criticism, so if you like it, please leave a comment. Hope you enjoy.

"When the sword of rebellion is drawn, the sheath should be thrown away." John Singleton Copley.

* * *

Life went on. Too quickly, Angeline was growing up.

She excelled at piano and singing, so much so that when Reid was upset about something, she could just play or sing for him and he'd be soothed. She excelled at dance as well, and it kept her growing body lithe and small. Most of all, she excelled at all the lessons Reid threw at her, remembering nearly everything he ever taught.

Darcy, too, was nice to live with. Those morning rituals, the quiet, casual conversations never stopped. If Reid wanted something, Reid got it—newspaper, coffee, new shoes, a haircut—the only limit was no cell phones and no laptops. Sometimes Reid would screw up—let Angeline fall and bruise herself, or forget to enforce good enunciation, or forget to clean something—and Darcy would knock him around a little for it. Reid always deserved it for his carelessness, though, so he never bore ill will towards Darcy afterwards. After all, Darcy  _did_ provide free food, shelter, and comfort.

Life was good, but Reid couldn't help but wish that Angeline would stay young and his forever. It felt like years had been stolen from him, somehow—he had only come into her life when she was six, so he had never been around for things like her first words, her first steps. He tried to make the most of the years he had, though.

When she was nine, she started becoming particularly fixated on his (still sanitized) stories about the BAU. She had him tell and re-tell them over and over. When she was nine and a half, she admitted she wanted to be just like him and be a profiler when she grew up. Reid warned her against telling Darcy about that, but he started working psychology into their lesson plans.

When she was ten, Reid got sick with pneumonia during tornado season. Even when a particularly bad tornado cut out all power for three days, Angeline refused to let him get out of bed and insisted on cooking and cleaning all by herself. Reid was proud of how she was able to do it all without any electrical appliances. When she was ten and a half, Reid started working in geographical profiling, psycholinguistics, and a little bit of criminology to the lesson plans.

When she was eleven…

"Dad?"

Reid looked up from his place kneeling in front of the oven. He straightened up again to his full height, taking off his mitt and putting it on the counter.

"Angeline?"

She was chewing her lip, red starting to come to her white cheeks. Reid didn't remember ever seeing her embarrassed with him, so he was immediately concerned. "Is something wrong?"

She glanced away, pulling her braid over her shoulder and squeezing it nervously. "Dad, remember how you told me that I could talk to you about anything?"

Reid furrowed his brow, walking to the table and pulling out a chair to sit in. "Yeah. Of course I do. Is something wrong?"

"Well, it's not exactly…" She paused, still chewing her lip, her hands hovering in front of her as though she didn't know what to do with them. "I just had my period."

…

"What?"

Her face was burning. So was Reid's. "I'm having my period! You know, that thing you said girls had and you gave me a book about!"

"Y-yeah, yeah, I know."

Oh boy.

"Just… uh, alright. Alright." It was times like this when Reid wished he had a woman around to help him out with things like this. "Uh… why don't you go, uh, clean everything up. I'll talk to Darcy about sanitary napkins."

She nodded, pursing her lips, and spun around, scampering out quickly in a flurry of gangly white limbs. He shouldn't have been so surprised—after all, she was growing. Five foot, five inches. Swollen chest. Rounding hips. Awkward gait that Darcy disdained.

But despite all that, Reid still saw her as the same little girl who crawled into his bed at night because of nightmares.

Reid scrawled a note on a piece of paper, then slid it under the kitchen door, explaining the situation and requesting that Darcy get pads and tampons.

Reid was cleaning the kitchen after lunch when the door opened and Darcy stuck his head in, holding the note in the air.

"No."

Reid straightened from wiping down the counter, blinking owlishly at Darcy from behind his glasses. "No?"

"No." Darcy put the note on the table, giving Reid a small scowl. "I'm not getting those things myself.  _You_  will get them."

Reid blinked again, then threw away the paper towel he was using and set the cleaning spray on the counter. "Darcy, I can't. I'm not allowed out of the house, remember?"

"You are now."

Darcy only received a blank stare, but he continued.

"Once a week, I'll give you cash and keys to a car. You stay out for a maximum of an hour and a half. You only use that time for shopping at the local strip mall. You never go anywhere else without getting my permission first. Are we clear?"

Reid furrowed his brow, awkwardly pulling his hands closer to his chest, as if to defend against this strange, somewhat scary development. "But… who's going to be with Angeline for that time?"

"She's had her period." Darcy's eyes flicked towards the door leading to the hallway. "I'll be with her."

Reid wrung his hands, looking at the ground, his throat tightening with anxiety. "I don't want to leave her. I don't like being away."

"She's growing up. She doesn't need you like she did."

Something about that statement chilled Reid, but a small dismissive motion from Darcy made him flinch and bow his head. Better to just do as told. He didn't want to be knocked around. "May I have the keys, then?"

Darcy dug into his pocket, taking out keys and a hundred dollar bill. "And only get pads. No tampons."

He placed it on the table, where Reid picked it up and quietly made his retreat, not even bothering to ask questions since he knew Darcy was already impatient. Alright. Leaving his daughter at home for the first time to drive when he hadn't driven in five years.

What could go wrong?

* * *

Actually, not that much, apparently.

Reid had taken a moment to stare at the car in the driveway warily, holding his hands above his eyes to shield them from the unfamiliar sun. He couldn't stay outside forever, since he would surely be sunburned after so long of only going out at night, so he was forced to actually get  _in_  the car. He spent quite some time just sitting there with his hands on the wheel, remembering how the hell to work the damn thing.

Then he turned the vehicle on, switched it to Drive, and pulled out of the driveway.

In his haste to get Reid out of the house, Darcy had neglected to warn him about the snow on the ground. Or, for that matter, to tell him where the mall  _was._

Reid, luckily, had that blessed eidetic memory. He just recalled the things he'd seen out the window of the car during the few times he and Angeline were driven out of the house. That combined with his encyclopedic knowledge of American roads led him to the mall relatively easy.

But the mall was a beast all unto itself. When Reid took one step inside, he almost sprinted out again.

There were people. And noise. And more people. The light was bright and the smells were overwhelming and people were brushing against his arms and the unfamiliar touches by strangers made his skin crawl and his chest get tight. He quickly scurried away from the entrance, lurking near the wall to avoid the Minnesota crowd, and he just stayed there, staring at the area like a spooked animal and trying to even out his breathing.

No one took notice of him. His eyes ached and his ears hurt and he was chafing in the presence of so many people he didn't know. He wished that Darcy had come with him; the man knew how to command a room, and Reid would have been safe from all these foreign signals.

He spent five minutes backed against a wall, just observing the place and trying to cope with all the sensory input.

Then he took a deep breath, ducked his head, and wandered through the building. Find a drugstore. Find a goddamn drugstore, get the feminine hygiene products, then get the hell out of this place.

He wandered for fifteen minutes, but he never asked anyone for directions. Never engaged. He didn't really remember how to talk to someone he didn't know. He avoided looking at anyone's face, preferring to keep his head down and his eyes flicking to store displays.

Finally, he found a CVS. He bought what he needed, was oblivious to the strange looks he got from the female cashier, and then made a beeline for the exit. Out. Out out out out out out out out out—

And then he was out, back in the freezing winter and the sun burning his ghostly pale skin. He got into the car, started it up, and drove out of the parking lot, his heartbeat finally slowing down and his anxiety waning. He had spent forty minutes away from home, and he felt  _exhausted_. And he would have to do this again next week?

He shuddered at the thought, but pushed it aside. The important part was that it was over now.

When he came back home through the backdoor (as the front of the house was still forbidden from him and Angeline), he knew that his absence had been felt. There was the skittering of feet against the floor, and then he was suddenly tackled, long white limbs wrapped tight around his waist.

"You didn't say you would leave!"

Hearing his daughter, he felt the last of his anxiety bleed out. "Sorry, Angel. I had to get something for you."

She looked up at him, her lower lip stuck out in an expression she would insist wasn't a pout. "You didn't say you were going, though."

Anyone else would have said that he had only been gone forty minutes.

Reid just stroked her hair, soothed by her presence, until she finally let him go. He pushed the CVS bag into her arms, giving her a smile. "This is all for keeping clean during your period, alright? I wish I could explain how to use it, but I don't exactly have any practical experience. The instructions are on the side of the pack, I think."

She pulled away, glancing into the bag. "Thanks, Dad. I'm sure I'll figure it out. I'm smart."

"You certainly are."

As he watched her walk away from him, he thought. And then he dragged himself to his room, where he just lay in the bed and stared at the ceiling. He hadn't been outside alone in years; he had utterly forgotten how bewildering the world was. He didn't know if he'd be up for doing it again, but he supposed if Angeline needed it, he would make himself.

Then he took the time to consider why he had to go out in the first place. His girl was growing up. She was almost the age he was when he—

He closed his eyes and willed the thoughts of his old life away. The memories were really only whispers now, and whispers he didn't dwell on much. He didn't want to tell Angeline stories of his childhood. She knew little—she knew about his father, his mother, and the vague outline of cruelty. Reid didn't want to show her that dark side of the world yet. She was too young.

He fell asleep without realizing. And then he woke up to elbows in his stomach and a big white face up against his.

"Dad, there's plenty of time for sleep during nighttime."

Reid jerked at the rude awakening, pushing the elbows off his stomach before their pointy-ness punctured an organ. "Angeline!"

"Daddy!" she said, imitating his tone before pushing him closer to the edge of the bed and then lying next to him. "You wake me up from  _my_  naps, so  _yours_  are fair game."

"You never sleep at night when you've had a nap."

"Oh, and you do?"

"Hey, who's the parent here?" Nonetheless, Reid smiled, and slid his arm under Angeline's neck so he could rest his hand on her head and tilt it towards him for him to kiss. "Besides, I wake you up nicely. I don't jam my elbows into you."

"Oh please, they weren't that bad."

"Oh, yes they were. You're a bony girl, believe it or not."

" _You're_  one to talk!"

He looked down at her, and he couldn't help but chuckle softly at her sardonic look. Apparently, adolescents were universally obligated to point out their parents' flaws. "Well, you have a point, but I'm still the parent. Were you able to put on the pad alright?"

Any other girl would blush at their father asking them that. Angeline only nodded her head, resting her temple against his shoulder. "Yeah. It looked like they printed those instructions for idiots."

"Well, they're meant to be understandable for the lowest common denominator. Not everyone is as smart as you, Angel."

Angeline poked him gently in his side. "Lucky I have you around, right?"

Reid didn't answer. He just smiled and lightly ran his fingers against her hair, pulled into her usual white braid. She relaxed against his side, her breath evening out a little. "Oh, and while you were gone, Darcy said that he was going to eat dinner with us tonight. He wants me to cook."

"Disaster in the making, I can already tell." It was strange for Darcy to want to spend time around Angeline, but Reid didn't think too hard about it. "Why don't I drill you a little on cooking before tonight, then?"

"That requires you actually  _getting up_."

"Hey." He whacked her head gently with his hand despite the fact he was smirking. "Don't be sassy. Go to the kitchen. I'll be there in a minute."

There was a soft laugh, a kiss on his cheek, and then she withdrew, jumping off the bed and running. Even as an adolescent, he hadn't been able to break her of her 'run in the halls' habit. At a certain point, he just decided to pick his battles.

Reid lay there for a bit. Then he got up and went to the kitchen. That brief taste of the outside was burned in him, and kept tugging all throughout the day, even as he slowly began to bury it again. How would he do that every week?

He didn't think about much as he drilled his daughter, though. What memories that might have wriggled their way to the surface if given the chance were gone again.

He was happy here. Why jeopardize that?

* * *

Despite his apprehension, he came to be able to tolerate the weekly outings, and even sometimes took advantage of them to drop by the book store in the mall and flip through whatever had come out in the last five years. He knew that Darcy would be upset if he spoke to anyone he didn't have to, so he refused to talk to anyone who spoke to him save the cashier at whatever store he went to. If he was asked a question, his response was concise and then he would quickly move away. It earned him a few stares, but the employees at the stores he frequented learned quickly and just left him to his own devices when he came along on the weekends.

The part he was happiest about, really, was that the crowds started to become less and less overwhelming, and Angeline became less and less anxious when he left. So long as he was back within about an hour, she didn't worry about him leaving, but he still felt bad for leaving at all.

So one day as snowdrops pushed their way through what little snow was left, he decided to get her a present, just to make up for being gone. Maybe it would have been best to get her something girly, like a barrette or a pretty necklace, but he didn't know how Darcy would react to much more color than the occasional flower in her hair. Instead of that, he chose to get her a book. One that she would want to read over and over because she loved the story. Reid never reread books except a few special ones, but Angeline didn't have an eidetic memory, and he knew well enough how she liked to have the same story told to her over and over, no matter how well she knew it.

So he sat in a little corner of the bookstore, far away from regular customers and in between shelves full of fiction, surrounded by a big pile of young adult fiction. They were all pretty easy to whiz through on their own, but he wanted to pick something Angeline would really like, so he was doing his best to pay attention to the stories and how they were written despite the fact he wasn't generally one for fiction.

Chatter floated around him, quiet and easy to block out.

"Do you have this in paperback?"

Unfortunately, most stories didn't have albino girl protagonists; if anything, people with albino characteristics were usually the villain of a story. He couldn't exactly tailor the books to make Angeline included the way that all the art in the house did (over the years, he had become used to the paintings, but they still were a little creepy in their repetitive, obsessive subject matter).

"I really just want him to enjoy reading. Harry Potter's good for that, right?"

When he read a book with a 'ghostly pale, red-eyed' villain, Reid quickly put it aside. Due to his and Darcy's efforts, he knew that Angeline didn't have a problem with her albinism, and now that she was an impressionable adolescent, Reid didn't want to start engendering body image issues.

He would have to settle for a regular female protagonist without an albino villain, then. Maybe one day he'd be able to find a young adult book with an albino protagonist.

"Reid…? Is that you?"

She liked magical realism, so Reid started moving onto books like Beloved by Toni Morrison. Looking at that, he frowned, wondering exactly how much adult subject matter he was comfortable showing Angeline. She knew about slavery, but did he really want to expose her to things like graphic rape?

That book went into the 'no' pile. Maybe he'd give it to her for her sixteenth birthday or something. She'd enjoy it when she was old enough.

"Reid?"

Most of the newer books weren't particularly well-written, and while she would have fun picking apart the sentences and plot holes, Angeline generally turned her nose up at poor quality artwork. It made her hard to shop for, but maybe if he—

"Hey, boy genius."

Someone flicked his head. Reid jumped, and in less than a second, he had gone from sitting cross-legged to standing up, swinging around to see who was touching him.

His breath caught in his throat.

"Whoa, easy, it's just me. I almost forgot what the BAU does to your startle reaction." Elle laughed, crossing her arms and thrusting out her hips in the way she always did when she was teasing him. "Well, you don't have to worry. No serial killers here."

His mouth felt like dead leaves—delicate, dry, and ready to crack to pieces if it moved.

After a moment, Elle's brow furrowed. "Hey, you okay?"

His mind was utterly blank. It felt like a dream, like he was living out one of those stories he told Angeline, like—

He didn't realize he was doing it. For the first time in five years, he reached out to someone who wasn't Angeline. He reached out, grabbed Elle by the waist, and pulled her into a tight hug, resting his face in the crook of her neck.

"Oh! Oh, uh…"

She smelled like autumn, like dying leaves and brushfire smoke, just like he remembered.

_Remembered._

"Hey, hey, it's okay." She wrapped her arms around him. Her chin was resting on his shoulder. Her hair was grown back to how it was before Randall Garner, and it was soft against his cheek. "Whatever it is, it's okay. Bad cases—it's okay."

Bad cases. A bad case. A bad case with a bad person to profile.

_Profiler._

He didn't know how long they stood there. It felt like the woman in his arms would dissolve and slip away like smoke at any moment, but she was there. She remained solid.

His common sense started to filter back in and he pulled away, quickly taking off his glasses and wiping his eyes without looking at her face. "I'm sorry. I, uh, I didn't mean…" He shoved his glasses back on his face, glancing up at her concerned expression. "It was a bad case, yeah. A bad series of cases, actually. I came up here to get my mind off things."

The lie came easily. It didn't even occur to him to tell the truth.

Some of her concern seemed to ebb. Not all, but some. Anyone who had ever been part of the BAU understood needing to get away every once in a while. "Well, you picked the perfect spot. No one comes to Minnesota. No one except me, of course." A small sardonic smile tugged at her lips. "I'm here to visit some cousins. I didn't think I'd meet you here."

She started towards the door and jerked her head for him to follow her. Instinctively, he did so. Teammate. He listened to his teammates. Unless he didn't. But he was now. "Oh, and tell Morgan that he's going to get an earful next time he shows his face around California."

_Morgan._

_Morgan._

"O-oh? Why's that?"

Elle looked over her shoulder at Reid, her eyes sparkling with her smile. She looked so much happier. Better. Her Fisher King wounds had been healed. "Because I've been freaking out for years over nothing. I dunno how well you remember, but you went missing five years ago? The team was calling everyone you might have contacted, and when they called me, I made Morgan promise to call if they found you. And here I've been thinking you were dead."

His mouth went dry again and his throat constricted, but Elle was looking forward again. "While we're here, let me treat you. I know this really great café a little walk away from the mall. We need to catch up; we don't even need to talk about work, but just tell me how your life's been."

He followed her like a ghost. She could have walked off a cliff. He would have followed.

"So, let's hear it. Have you cured cancer? Solved Global Warming? Become the next Bill Gates?"

"I had a daughter."

She stopped so fast he almost crashed into her. Then she spun around, her eyes almost popping out of her head. "Wait, what?"

He backed up to give them both some room, his mouth running of its own accord. "I had a daughter. Soon after I was, you know, captured that time five years ago. Her name's Angeline."

"Angeline?" Elle blinked, then her mouth broke into a grin, which she hid behind her hand. "Angeline. Oh God, if  _you_  have kids, that means I really need to hurry up. Who's the mother? Do I know her?"

He shook his head automatically. He didn't know why he was spilling all this out. Darcy would be so mad at him. "N-no. Her mom's not in the picture. It's just us. I was actually looking for a book for her to, you know, make up for needing to be gone a lot."

She gave him a strange look, but she tactfully didn't ask about the mother, probably assuming she was dead. She started to walk again and Reid once again was following, pulled along by an invisible string. "Well, no wonder those books were so thick. I bet she's a genius too."

That made Reid smile to himself, no small amount of pride in his voice when he said, "She can hold her own in a game of chess with me."

Elle whistled, leading him out of the mall. "Remind me to never try going up against her, then. Can I meet her?"

Reid kept his eyes focused on her shoulder, not wanting to look her in the eye but unable to look away. "N… Not right now. She's with me, but she's really sick and she gets fussy when she's sick. I'll, uh… I'll call you. If you ever come by, I bet she'd love to meet you."

"Can't wait." She glanced at Reid, and he couldn't help but look at her face, even with all the lies spilling out of him. It felt like he was being shocked right through his spine every time she spoke, he saw that familiar smile, the sarcastic smirks. "I'll take her out to get her nails done. I bet you never do that."

Reid gave her a strange look. "Why? Is that something you're supposed to do with little girls?"

She just smiled and shook her head. The smell of exhaust permeated the parking lot, but then they stepped on grass, just walking, and the cars were soon behind them.

"What about you, Elle? What's happened in your life? I'm—I'm sorry I lost contact with you, but—"

"No, I get it, Reid. The job gets in the way of things. But we can always start over." Her smile became mischievous. She was smiling more in this little meeting than she ever had when they were working together. "Guess who got engaged five days ago."

"Wait, seriously?" Reid looked at her face again, and for a moment, his smile matched hers exactly. "That's great! I'm really happy for you. What's his name?"

"Darren. I came up here to tell some family in person. Now that I know you're not rotting in a ditch, you and Angeline are getting an invitation when we set the date." She crossed her arms in front of her chest, looking forward to see where they were going. "You still live at the same address, right?"

It was such a simple question.

Yet all of a sudden, Reid felt sick. Completely and utterly sick. "Uh…" Another lie. Another lie. Same address. The place he used to live. Before. Before. There was a before. "Yeah. Yeah, I do."

Elle glanced back, then stopped in her tracks, peering at his face. "Reid? You okay? You're looking a little green."

He had to go. Get away. Too much. Dream pulling him in—he was in the wide open outdoors, the unfamiliar sun beating on his pale skin, and he felt claustrophobic.

It wasn't a dream. Life before Angeline wasn't a dream. There was a  _before._

"I… I don't feel well. I must have gotten what Angeline has. Do you, uh—why don't I call you later? Catch up when I'm feeling better?"

Elle's eyes narrowed suspiciously. "Sure…"

Get out. No. No. It wasn't safe. He could feel himself waking up from something blissful, and it was terrifying. He used to own his own home. It was barren and neat, but his, and he used to flop onto the bed without getting undressed and sleep and then wake up when—

He struggled against the realization. He didn't want it. He knew that something was happening to him, and once it was over, it wouldn't go back to the way it was.

Reid backed away, staring at the grass under his feet, when Elle was in front of him again, craning her neck and looking him in the eyes. Her eyes.

He remembered. He remembered sitting in her hotel room, drinking with her, listening to her talk about fingers in her wound.

"Are you sure you're okay, Reid?"

His heartbeat roared in his ears, and he felt words spill out without knowing what they were. "I don't know. I don't think so. But I'll be okay. I just need some time, okay? I'll be okay."

Another moment of her staring at him. He felt like he was going to explode.

"…If you need to talk, you have my number. See you, Reid."

She walked past him. She was gone. And then he was gone, barely seeing where he was going, just needing to get to the car. Darcy's car.

When he got there, he sat in the driver's seat, locked the doors, closed the tinted windows, and rested his forehead on the steering wheel. His mind was vibrating so hard that it felt like it was going to fall apart.

It was a struggle. He fought it, the feelings and memories bubbling to the surface, because they were dreams, there was no before, he was Angeline's father and Darcy provided them with food and shelter and comfort out of the kindness of his heart, and life was  _good._  It was  _good._  The worst he had to fear were Darcy's punishments, and they were always lenient.

It took Reid a while to realize he was repeating under his breath, over and over—"Life is good. Life is good. Life is good."

His knuckles were white on the steering wheel. He was late for going back home. Darcy was going to be angry. Angeline was going to be upset. He had to get back.

His hands shook as he started the car and pulled out of the lot. Good. Good. Life was good.

Good.

He didn't pay attention. He couldn't. Every time he would begin to think again, he'd just—there were memories.

_"Emily, I really don't know what to do in dances. Why are you taking me?"_

_"Because I'm teaching you how to deal with dances."_

_"I really don't think—"_

_"Just because you won't be great doesn't mean you can't function. You said you wanted to learn how to talk to girls, so I'm teaching you."_

_"I didn't really mean—"_

_"Shhhh just let the teacher talk. Now pretend you're flirting with me. That will make you seem a lot more attractive to other girls."_

_"Wait, what?"_

_"Just do it, Reid."_

He shook his head roughly, narrowly avoiding the motion traveling to the wheel. He could feel his eyes getting wet. He remembered straight, glossy black hair. Keen eyes. Teasing. She loved teasing.

He wanted to see that face again. Wanted to hear that voice. The thought made it harder to keep tears back. Visions of others—purple lipstick, soft smiles, eyes that never blinked—prickled in the back of his mind, but he outright threw the memories away. He didn't  _want_  them. They had to go away again. No more. He needed sleep. Damn that woman for doing this, for being at that mall, for—

Home loomed as he drove further and further into the woods, far from the town. Reid pulled into the driveway. The sound of gravel calmed him down, but only a little. Home. Home. He pushed the door open and stumbled out, squinting at the light.

"What are you doing here?"

Reid looked up, his entire body hunching over to make himself seem smaller. The mansion was blinding, with the sun reflecting off the white paint. Next to that, the big men in black suits approaching him from the front door were striking.

The contrast hurt Reid's head. He shoved his hands into his pockets, looking down at his feet. The men were reaching into their jackets.

"I live here," he mumbled softly, making the men pause. Reid averted his eyes, barely taking in the information around him. Cars. Nice, expensive cars parked in the driveway. Shades are drawn. Darcy was having a meeting.

"Look up."

There was the barest flicker in Reid's mind. Something bad, something he had to get rid of.

He didn't have to listen.

Reid chewed the inside of his cheek and looked up anyway.

Two men. Shaved heads. Sunglasses. Expensive suits. All an attempt to give the image of uniformity, and thus, of numbers. Showing that their employers were wealthy enough to afford good clothes for even their guards, and the sunglasses were meant to have a dehumanizing effect. If you can't see a person's eyes, they're not a person.

But they  _are_  people. The one on the right—tan line on ring finger, recently divorced, with an old fake front tooth that looks just a little brighter and whiter than his others, implying growing up with siblings, most likely brothers, who liked to roughhouse. The one on the left—scars along the top and bottom lips (he has a habit of chewing on them when he's concentrating) that seem to be fading a little bit (he recently started trying to stop himself), and standing slightly in front of the other (alpha personality, probably trying to work himself up the ranks).

All of that information ran through his head with shocking clarity, frighteningly familiar, as if the skills had simply slept for five years and now were awakened refreshed.

"What's your name?" asked the alpha personality. Their hands were still in their jackets, their arms tense. It didn't take a genius to know what they were ready to do.

"Spencer." Reid ducked his head again, making a vague gesture towards the side yard. "I'm going through the backdoor. I don't know what your bosses are here for. I don't know what you're talking to Darcy about. I'm just here to go home."

The men both looked at him hard, because regardless of divorces or scarred lips, they would kill him without batting an eye.

He wasn't scared.

Reid wasn't scared.

Finally, the alpha relaxed, moving his hand out into the open again, which prompted the other to do the same. "Cordova said you were coming. He's not happy."

"Of course he's not. I'm late." Then Reid ducked his head again and trudged around the house until he stepped into the backdoor and kicked off his shoes.

His footsteps were light. He didn't want to see Angeline. Not like this. Too much to think about.

When he went into his room, he left the door open. He always did. It would get too dark otherwise, but this time, he didn't even think about it.

He slowly lay down on his bed and closed his eyes, focusing all his energy on his internal struggle.

Elle.

_"Here's to winning."_

No, no, no, why would she be there, why would she do this to him, he's happy, he's happy, he's happy—

But he's not.

His throat constricted, and he put his palms over his eyes. With the memory of Elle's face, he couldn't stop the memories of other faces tumbling into his mind. Gideon. Hotch. Rossi. Morgan. Emily. JJ. Garcia. They weren't just names. They weren't just characters in stories he told a little girl. They were real people, and—and—

"My name is Supervisory Special Agent Dr. Spencer Reid. I'm a profiler."

And with that, he remembered.

He had never agreed to be here. He tried to escape, but then Angeline made him promise not to. Before that, he had a life. A job. His mother was Diana Reid and she was in a sanitarium. His father was William Reid and they were estranged. He had  _friends_ —Lila, John, Austin—and his family… his family was the people he worked with, the people he loved, and….

…And he had forgotten that they were real.

He had forgotten that anything was real.

It felt like his chest was in a vice. He could feel tears overflowing beneath his palms, and he couldn't stop them, they had been stopped for years and they refused to be any longer, and—

"Dad?" came a soft voice. "Do you have a migraine?"

Reid snapped back into the present, removing his hands and opening his eyes to look at the door, seeing the little waifish adolescent hovering there.

For one brief, terrifying moment, she was a stranger. Worse, a chain that had tied him to his prison and brainwashing. She wasn't his daughter.

The feeling was gone in a flash, but she saw the change. Her eyes went wide and her hands grasped the frame of the door, as if she were about to be torn away from him forever.

He wiped his tears and sat up on the edge of the bed, then reached out his arms for her. "I'm sorry, Angel. I'm sorry."

She paused, drifting just beyond the threshold.

Maybe this was his choice. Maybe he had to pick between his memories and his daughter.

But she crept into the room, her brow knitted together, and allowed him to wrap his arms around her waist.

One white hand drifted up, fluttering against his cheek. "Why are you crying, Daddy?"

"Nothing. Nothing." He held her close, letting his face rest against her shoulder. He wanted to know she was there, and he didn't want her to see the tears. "Thoughts."

Her fingers wove into his hair. His ear was against her neck, and he could hear her heart beating, reassuring him that she was real and alive. "Something happened outside, didn't it?"

He hesitated, then pulled away, keeping his arms firmly around her but fixing his eyes on her face. Still so  _young._  How much had she changed since he had come here? A little, but… not as much as children should. She was still sheltered, still only able to really communicate with Reid, tutors, and Darcy, never having even spoken to a person her age in her life. Reid had been a party to that. Hell, he had  _encouraged_  it.

He had kept her locked away from the world.

Reid had to blink away any more tears, reaching out and tucking a lock of bright white hair behind a white ear. No. Not anymore.

"Dad?'

Her eyes were concerned. He cupped her face in his hands, bringing her down and giving her a gentle kiss. "I love you, Angeline."

He could feel her eyelashes against his face as she blinked in confusion. "I love you too, Daddy. But really, what—"

"So you decided to show up."

Both Angeline and Reid nearly got whiplash from looking up so fast, and Reid instinctively held his daughter closer.

Darcy loomed in the doorway, mouth in a straight, grim line, and eyes hard.

"Angeline, leave. Now."

Reid released the girl and she scampered out immediately. She was used to Reid's punishments. She knew that she wasn't wanted there when they were happening.

Reid felt his heart begin to race. He stood up, turning his eyes to the ground and approaching Darcy meekly. He felt defenses go up. Memories began to fade again, dangerous to hold onto at the moment. "I'm sorry I'm so late. I-I lost track of—"

The hand on his cheek cracked like a whip. He recoiled with a yelp, instinctively covering his face.

" _Forty minutes!_ "

Fingers clenched in his hair, and then a fist was pounding him. Reid yelped again, trying to pull away, but his hair kept him in place and strained his neck, forcing him to stay still for the pain.

"That is  _not—_ " Kick in the stomach. "— _losing_ track of  _time!_ "

At a certain point, Reid just cleared his mind. He went limp in his master's grip, accepting the punishment. He deserved it, after all. He had known what would happen if he was late. He had been late anyway.

The taste of blood spread through his mouth. His lip had cut itself on a tooth. He focused on the coppery tang, and not the pain.

And then the pain was over. He was thrown on his bed. He curled up, focusing on breath.

A moment passed. Two. Three. Four.

Then he felt the weight of Darcy sitting down beside him.

"Sit up."

Reid immediately obeyed. He pushed himself up with his hands, then slowly sat up beside Darcy, his head bowed. Every spot where he had been struck hurt. He knew that he'd have bruises for a few days.

Carefully, a gentle finger brushed against his lower lip, wiping away the blood. The gesture surprised Reid since Darcy was such a clean man, but it was soothing in its intimacy.

"You know I don't like doing that."

Reid wasn't entirely sure if he believed that, but at the very least, he knew that Darcy didn't want to hurt  _him._  He nodded, lacing his fingers in his lap. "I'm sorry, Darcy. I won't be that late again."

"I know." Darcy's hand rested on his shoulder briefly, and then it was gone, the man standing up and smoothing himself out. "Go clean yourself up. I'll be having dinner with you and Angeline, so make sure she doesn't burn herself when she cooks."

"I will. Thank you, Darcy."

Then Darcy was gone.

As Reid stood up, slowly wiping blood from his mouth, he realized that he had thanked a man for beating him.

Well, it was a very lenient punishment, the part of him that had developed over five years said. He had been late. He should have had much worse.

_That doesn't give anyone the right to hit you._

Yes, it does. Darcy provided food, shelter, and comfort, all for free.

_You never wanted him to._

Why does what Reid wants matter? The point is that now he's… he's…

_You have Stockholm's._

Reid took a deep breath, his hands beginning to shake.

It's not like that.

_Yes it is._

He licked his dry lips, bowing his head and walking to the bathroom. He struggled with himself while he dabbed on concealer to hide the bruises. Flecks of a life he had forgotten rose to the surface. He didn't know how to put on any kind of makeup before. He had learned after three months of being in this house, because he hadn't… he hadn't wanted to frighten Angeline with bruises.

His face was tender. He winced when his fingertips brushed against the black and white splotches growing on his face. He tried focusing on the pain, anchoring him in the present. These were marks he had earned through carelessness. They would heal up, and eventually, he would make another mistake, and they would be back.

_Battered person syndrome. The psychological condition of a person who suffers persistent abuse of some kind, often by a family member or lover. Usually called battered wife syndrome, battered child syndrome, or battered woman syndrome, depending on context. Characterized by a period of denial, then of guilt and self-blame, then of a desire to leave the unhealthy relationship._

Reid's hands started to shake. He tried to ignore the niggling in his head.

_Don't let the unsub win. You know, now. You know._

He didn't want to know, though.

Reid did his best to push away the thoughts, the ideas, the memories, and just concentrated on concealing the wounds inflicted by Darcy.

Some things are better left forgotten.

* * *

The niggling wouldn't leave him alone, but it was getting quieter. Reid was certain it would be buried again if he just forced it for a week.

He didn't have that chance. He only had two days to try.

"No, no, you forgot to derive the inside function before multiplying it with the derivative of the outside function. Let me show you." Reid had to wrap his arm around Angeline's shoulders to take the hand holding her pencil, guiding her in rewriting the original trigonometric function. Lunch cooked in the oven, the smell of chicken wafting around the room as they worked at the kitchen table. "It's the chain rule. You see, multiply G—"

The kitchen door slammed open. Reid only looked up in time to be punched in the face.

"What the  _hell_  did you tell her?!"

Another punch, this one in the back of his head, causing him to bash his forehead against the table. That one provoked a shriek from Angeline, and a clatter of her jumping from her chair.

"Darcy! Darcy, what are you—"

Reid stumbled out of his chair, pressing his hands on the corner of the table to steady himself, and looked up just in time to see Angeline tugging at Darcy's sleeve, and Darcy lashing out to backhand her across the face.

Angeline yelped in surprise, recoiling, and Reid suddenly found himself in between his daughter and the larger man, pressing his hands up against Darcy's chest to stop him from advancing. "Darcy! Stop! Not her, you know that, not her!"

"You  _wretched—_ " a fist clipped Reid's temple, making his vision burst to black for a moment, "— _ungrateful_ —" another clip sent Reid against the wall, forcing Angeline to run out from behind him with a yelp "— _spineless_ —" punch in the stomach, making him double over "— _womanly_ —" fingers curled in his hair, then roughly pulled him upright and bashed his skull against the wall "— _bastard!_ "

Angeline screamed again. Reid wanted to wave her away, to tell her to get out of the room and go practice piano or something, but the world was spinning and his head was pounding and he hadn't even recovered from his last punishment, let alone gotten ready for another one. He reached up, resting his hands on Darcy's tangled in his hair, groaning softly in pain.

"What did you tell her?!"

Being held up by his hair felt like Darcy was trying to tear his scalp off. Reid squinted, choking out a soft "What do you mean?"

That was the wrong thing to say. His skull was smacked into the wall again, eliciting another cry from Angeline. The girl was backed up, pressed against the fridge, staring with wide, terrified eyes at her father.

"A little bird came and told me you met an old friend.  _What did you tell her?!_ "

Elle.

Another smack against the wall. Stars burst in Reid's vision. In the back of his mind, he wondered if he was going to die tonight.

"I didn't tell her anything. I swear, I didn't tell her anything—"

"Don't  _lie!_ "

He was thrown to the ground. The floor was cold against his palms, and his dying vision dimmed the light. He could hear his own breathing. Past the screams of his daughter, he could hear his breath.

And then his windpipe was being crushed, because Darcy grabbed the back of his collar, pulling him up to his knees, and just as his hands instinctively flew to his throat, the top two buttons of his shirt popped off.

"I didn't tell her anything, Darcy. I didn't tell her anything!"

He was beyond listening, and Reid knew that. Controlled demeanor, and icy calm under most circumstances, with an undercurrent of rage that Reid was finding himself the focus of.

"Angeline! Stop that screaming and get  _out!_ "

She didn't listen to Darcy. She didn't get out. Hopefully, he wouldn't consider the disobedience grounds to hurt her as well.

The pops of buttons flying away, skittering across the floor. His shirt wasn't there anymore. He was bare, trembling. He heard the clink of a belt buckle. He crossed his arms across his chest and bowed his head until his forehead touched the floor. It didn't take a genius to know what was coming next.

It was the first time Darcy had ever lashed him. As the belt came down on his back, Angeline shrieked, and his vision became white.

And then the white became filled with memories.

_"You can be anything you want to be, Spencer." His mother's hand trailed through his hair, and his head lay at her breast, light filtering through the drapes and books surrounding them. "Anything at all. And no matter what you become, I'll be right there to support you."_

Lash.

_"Don't look so puzzled."_

_Gideon leaned back from his seat across from Reid, a small smile on his face and a twinkle in his eye. Reid continued to stare at the chessboard, frowning at his own checkmated king._

_"I haven't lost to anyone since I was six."_

_"Good thing I did it, then." Gideon leaned forward again, fingering the head of one of his pawns. "Losing is more educational than winning. If you lose, then that means there's still more for me to teach you."_

_Gideon reached forward and tapped Reid's king. The chess piece fell down, officially finishing the game._

Lash.

_"Oh, you are kidding me. That is **not**  fair."_

_Reid looked up curiously from his place in the corner of the room, nibbling delicately on a donut._

_While their teammates ignored them, preferring to review the files of their most recent case, Elle stalked over to Reid, scowling. "That is **not**  fair."_

_Reid blinked owlishly at her, then shifted his weight from foot to foot. "What's not fair?"_

_"That's your **fifth donut.**  I didn't even have one! How are you so skinny?!"_

_Blink blink blink. "I have a fast metabolism? I-I mean, it's not that—I mean, you're skinny too…"_

_"That's because I don't eat five donuts!" She brushed past him, huffing and grumbling to herself. Reid looked after her in puzzlement, and Morgan didn't even try to muffle his snickers._

Lash.

_"Come on, pretty boy. You're never going to be able to get out on the field this way."_

_Everything hurt. Reid pushed himself on his hands and knees, then looked up to scowl at Morgan. "You do realize that the Academy excused me from this, right?"_

_"Yeah, but Hotch and I haven't." Morgan offered Reid his hand. After a moment, Reid took it. "And you're not going out into the field until we know you're coming back alive."_

Lash.

_"Oh, and Reid. Here."_

_Reid jerked in surprise when a big corn muffin was placed on his desk. He leaned forward, his eyebrows raised, and then looked at Hotch, who already had his eyes fixed on a file and was walking away._

_"Wait, wait, Hotch, what is this for?"_

_Hotch paused, then turned around to face Reid again, his file lowering. "To let you know you're appreciated," he said simply. And then the file went back up and he was gone, knowing well enough that Reid doesn't like big fusses made over him._

_Reid stared after him, then looked down at the muffin, breaking a little piece off of the edge and taking a bite, a hunch percolating in the back of his mind._

_Oh God._

_It's his favorite from the bakery he always buys from down his street._

_He had no idea how Hotch knew, but he definitely felt appreciated._

Lash.

So much screaming. Weakness. He's felt this way before, like there's a very thin membrane between him and something he's never seen.

He could die.

_"Hey. You. Come with me."_

_Reid was just putting on his jacket when a blur of pink and fluff snagged his arm and started dragging him to the elevator. He made a surprised noise and instinctively flailed, although he knew better than to resist. "What? Garcia? Where?"_

_"To my kitchen!"_

_Reid's brow furrowed. "You know, that doesn't really make it much clearer…"_

_They stopped sharply in the elevator and Garcia spun around, punching the ground floor button. "It's Emily's birthday tomorrow, boy genius! And we're making her a cake."_

_Reid didn't even bother asking why he had been drafted into this. He just resigned himself to his fate. "I thought she didn't want a cake?"_

_"Oh, honey, you have so much to learn. When a woman says she doesn't want a cake, you make her a cake."_

_Garcia glanced back at Reid's baffled expression._

_"Just trust me on this one."_

His entire body went limp.

Lashes still tore his back apart.

Blood trickled down his spine.

He didn't feel the pain anymore.

_"Oh, don't look at me like that, Reid. You'll like it, trust me."_

_"Somehow, I seriously doubt that, Emily."_

_Reid grimaced at the salt on the back of his hand and the lemon wedge he held tight between his thumb and forefinger. He was sitting on Emily's couch across from her, a bottle of Tequila and two full shot glasses set in between them._

_"What can I say? I'm contractually obligated to teach my friends how to do Tequila shots." Emily gave him a playful smile, picking up her shot. "Now I'm going to count to three, and then we both lick the salt, swallow the shot, and suck on the lemon in one breath."_

_Reid had a distinct feeling that he would end up passed out on Emily's couch tonight._

_"One… two… three!"_

_He held his breath, licked the salt, and then took the shot._

With every lash, with every moment closer to simply closing his eyes forever, he found that he loved the belt all the more. The belt was a punishment he had never had, a real, honest to God risk to his life. Pain he had never dealt with before lanced across his body, and finally, the scars that had previously been invisible on his mind were making their way to his skin, and now he could finally see them again.

There is no reason to bury himself anymore. Now he knows.

He knows that he'll never be content here again.

The belt may take his life, but it gave him his soul back.

_"Reid. You need to show off more."_

_"Hmm?" Reid looked up from the piano. They had found it in the same building that they had found the bodies of three men in, and he had been checking to see if it worked by playing a song on it. "What do you mean?"_

_"I mean what I said. You need to show off more." Rossi strode past the old furniture covered in white tarp, weaving his way closer to Reid. "I mean, you don't mind showing what you know, but you're not showing off, you're just trying to be helpful. You're so talented at all these things that are usually useless in cases, so we never get to see you do them."_

_Reid followed Rossi's path with his eyes, cocking his head curiously. "So… you want to know what I'm good at?"_

_"Kid, I **know**  you're good at a lot of things. I want to  **see**  it." Rossi made it to the piano, and he leaned against it, light filtering in from a window behind him and casting his shadow across the storage room floor. "Why don't you play the piano at the Christmas Party we're having at my place?"_

_Reid frowned, shifting nervously on the piano bench. "I only started to learn a little while ago. I'm not sure how good I am."_

_"You're great." Rossi smiled at him. "And don't worry…" he gave a wink, "it'll only be the team and the kids."_

_Reid hesitated, but with that smile aimed at him, it was really hard to not be reassured._

_"Okay. I'll do it."_

"Please! Please, Darcy, stop, you're killing him! Oh God, oh God—"

Crying. She's crying. He wants to reach out to her.

Wants to wipe the tears away and tell her that it's okay. It doesn't hurt anymore.

_"Well congratulations, Reid. After playing with that chemistry set you got him for Christmas, Henry wants to be a scientist." Reid leaned back in his chair to watch JJ walk up to his desk. "At this rate, you're going to turn him into a prodigy by sheer force of will."_

_"There **is**  a theory that one can cultivate genius by spending ten thousand hours on something. So really, he'd turn himself into a prodigy by his own sheer force of will." Reid couldn't help but smile to himself, though. He was glad that Henry enjoyed his gift. He wasn't used to buying things for children, so he hadn't been sure what to get._

_"I think he's just trying to turn himself into **you**  by sheer force of will. You're his favorite profiler, you know." Her eyes were warm, and her smile was genuine. "You should babysit him more often. He keeps on begging to hear you read to him."_

The memory ended abruptly.

There was no noise save for the sound of his own shallow breathing and the choked sobs of Angeline. She must have stopped him. Must have held his arm. Otherwise, Reid was sure that Darcy would have continued to beat him long after he died.

He had no idea how many times he was lashed. He had no idea how long it had taken. It felt like only a few minutes, but it must have been longer. A few minutes did not do this much damage.

"Daddy…"

Stumbling footsteps. Light thump of a girl kneeling beside him. Gentle fingers running through his hair, wet from his sweat and blood. His eyes were closed, but he could imagine his blood staining her white fingertips red.

"Get away from him, Angeline. You're soiling yourself."

And the fingers were gone.

"No! No!"

Reid tried to force his eyes open, but his vision swam. White going away. Darcy was holding Angeline and taking her away.

"No! Daddy! DADDY!"

Open door. Locked door. Angeline pounding and screaming from behind it. Darcy would get angry.

Silence.

"Why did you make me do this to you?"

Honest regret. Even grief. Reid's never heard that from him before.

"Why would you make me do this to you?"

Reid's eyes drifted closed again.

Hands on his back. He flinched, hissing, because the hands makes all the pain rush back, so it is no longer a far away ache but sharp and real like a thousand knives embedded in his skin.

"Stop that. You can't fall asleep here."

Arms wrap around him. Pick him up. He writhes weakly, trying not to whimper, but the arms would be too strong for him under normal circumstances, let alone now.

And then he's put down again. A bed.

He heard the clicking before he felt the shackles latch around his ankles. He was beyond caring. He was so close to dying that it felt like he was rolling dice. It's all chance.

"You'll stay in here until I think you've had enough."

The blanket was pulled over him. Cloth rested on his back, sticking to the blood.

Door closed.

Left in darkness.

A promise to all the people he loves:

He'll escape and see them again.

One way or another.


End file.
